Worst balanced spells? I.e. most underpowered or overpowered spells

[Bannan_mantis]

I'm kinda just wondering what spells people might put here, I got a few ideas already but I'd like to hear people's suggestions and how they feel about this.

[Snivlem]

From the top of my head.
UP: find traps, witch bolt.
OP: Conjure animals, mass suggestion, wall of force, Forcecage, similacrum, wish.

[BamBam]

Booming Blade.

[SpanielBear]

True Strike

The worst.

[BamBam]

True Strike

The worst.

Are you positive?

[Izodonia]

OP: Protection from Evil and Good.

A 1st level, 10-minute spell that forces disadvantage on aberrations, celestials, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead - i.e. at least half of all creatures you fight. It's concentration, sure, but so is Blur, which does basically the same thing for a shorter amount of time and at 2nd level.

[MrStabby]

From memory...

Level 1
Shield (OP)
Witch Bolt (UP)

Level 2
Pass without trace (OP)
Find steed (OP)
Dust Devil (UP)

Level 3
Conjure animals (OP)
Counterspell (OP)
Hypnotic pattern (OP)
Fear (OP)
Conjure Barrage (UP)

Level 4
Polymorph (OP)
Banishment (OP)
Stoneskin (UP)

Level 5
Wall of force (OP)
Animate Objects (OP)



So UP is something I would struggle to find a reason to take. Some spells are pretty bad but might have their niche or be good in the right campaign. So Mislead is a bad spell... but there are cases where it is in fact the spell you want. They are just rare.

OP is a little trickier - here I judged it by its ability to cause problems as geting any objective sense of power outside of context is tough. So for example banishment is on the list for its ability to instantly remove someone who might be a crucial enemy on a single flailed save and to have them not come back. Pass without trace can make everyone be sufficiently good at stealth and obviates any investment a particualr character made into that skill - not "too good", but "powerful in a way that causes a problem".

And yeah, at higher levels what constitutes OP becomes quite blurry, so I skipped it.

[Aaron Underhand]

All the illusion spells..

UP or OP depending on DM

[SpanielBear]

Are you positive?

Pretty damn sure, it’s an underpowered mess. But hey, I’ll happily hear any argument to the contrary.

[RogueJK]

Pretty damn sure, it’s an underpowered mess. But hey, I’ll happily hear any argument to the contrary.

Same.

Spend your Action this round, to get the chance to roll 2d20 on 1 attack roll next round, if you don't get hit and lose Concentration in the interim.

Or, just roll 1d20 this round and 1d20 next round, giving you the same 2d20 chance to hit, but potentially hitting with 2 attacks instead of just 1. Plus there's no Concentration needed, so no chance of losing the 2nd d20 and you can be Concentrating on something better.

(It gets even worse if you have Extra Attack, and you're giving up more than just 1d20 in the round that you use your action to cast True Strike.)


There might be some niche situational use for it, like on an Arcane Trickster who ends up in some uncommon situation where they don't have any other way to trigger Sneak Attack, and therefore a shot at 1 Sneak Attack every other round is potentially better than 1 regular Attack each round, but even then stuff like that is not going to be common enough to recommend wasting a cantrip selection on True Strike "just in case". (And besides, it'd still be hogging your Concentration.)

[Darzil]

I presumed it's mainly useful for a spell attack, where you want to have less chance of wasting a higher level spell by taking two actions for it.

[ImproperJustice]

Wall of Force.

Completely trivializes 75% of the monster manual, especially in the hands of clever players. It should be much higher in level than it is.

Honestly, it should swap places with Prismatic Wall.

[SpanielBear]

I presumed it's mainly useful for a spell attack, where you want to have less chance of wasting a higher level spell by taking two actions for it.

But even then, it still is a mess because of a) the concentration element and b) the plethora of other ways one could get advantage without that sacrifice- hiding, familiar, another party member restraining or grappling... all of which are of varying effectiveness and resource expenditure but *still* more efficient than True Strike. It’s not just that it’s weak, it’s almost completely redundant.

[Galithar]

I presumed it's mainly useful for a spell attack, where you want to have less chance of wasting a higher level spell by taking two actions for it.

While it's true that many people don't think about this, try to make a list of High Level spells that require attack rolls. It would need to deal more damage than 4d10 at level 5, 6d10 at level 11, and 8d10 at level 17. In order to outdo casting two fire bolts.

[Willie the Duck]

For OP spells, and just in broad strokes:

Any spell that summons extra combatants to the combat is exceedingly effective.
Any spell that lets you change out your character for another creature, (particularly since 1) you often get their unusual abilities, and 2) when that creature dies you come back with little hp change) is exceedingly powerful.
Any spell that lets you remove actions from your opposition, especially whole or partial groups of them, is exceedingly effective. Bonus points if it makes said enemies extra vulnerable as well (held, asleep, etc.).
Wish, as usual, is exceedingly powerful and compared to previous editions the loophole to get out of the negative consequences is exceedingly straightforward.
For whatever reason, WotC (and TSR before them) decided that force fields are invulnerable except for specific spells (such as dispelling them). You can't overpower them, etc. Likewise force damage is something of a trump card, almost never being resisted or immunity (except for certain trumping of the trump card, such as Shield spell vs. Magic missile). For this reason, these can end up being a 'your doomed unless you have _____ available' spells. Classic example being non Eldritch Knight fighter vs. Wizard with Force Cage -- if they don't have an ally/magic item/spell from somewhere to get them out of it, no amount of strength checks or bashing it with weapons is going to free them.
Most of the spells with more open ended effects (Suggestion and illusions, as well as Similacrum and other summons and the shape-changing mentioned above) have the potential to be massively powerful, depending on how creative the player is, how restrictive the DM is, and so forth.


Other than that, there are some just numerically outlying things. Pass Without Trace being a good example -- +10 to one creature would have been reasonable, same with a lessor benefit (advantage, or just elimination of armor or similar disads) for that group, but for some reason they went with +10 for all friendlies in a 30' radius. I'm sure there are others like that.



I presumed it's mainly useful for a spell attack, where you want to have less chance of wasting a higher level spell by taking two actions for it.
I assume that was the original design intent. Perhaps it was created early in the game's development and whomever made it assumed that there would be a bunch of high-level spells which use attack rolls to deliver devastating effects. Using True Strike in 3e to deliver relative assurance that your Disintegrate beam would land was a fairly decent use of spell slots. However, you will note that 5e's Disintegrate doesn't use an attack roll, it's straight up Dex save. True Strike is a perfectly reasonable spell for another version of 5e that didn't materialize.

That's the main category of bad spells I've noticed -- perfectly reasonable spells for a different game (especially a lower power game). Witchbolt also would be fine*... if this were a different game where wizards didn't have cantrips or crossbows and still had a worse to-hit progression than other classes and doing 1d12 for up to 10 rounds without having to roll to hit after the initial casting was highly useful.
*as a first level spell. That the ongoing damage doesn't increase if you upcast the thing is just bad.

The other UP category I've noticed is mind-affecting Enchantment spells other than suggestion. Having the opponent automatically realize they've been charmed after the fact might be necessary to stop some specific PC shenanigans, but it effectively made most of those spells unusable in many situations (barring you using Disguise Self first, so they know they've been charmed, but mistake who did it).

[TheMango55]

Wall of Force.

Completely trivializes 75% of the monster manual, especially in the hands of clever players. It should be much higher in level than it is.

Honestly, it should swap places with Prismatic Wall.

Wait, you think prismatic wall should be level 5?

[noob]

From the top of my head.
UP: find traps, witch bolt.
OP: Conjure animals, mass suggestion, wall of force, Forcecage, similacrum, wish.

Find trap is a very useful spell unless you are in a game were either traps are completely inexistent or a game where everything is trapped.
Yes I know it does nothing against chests because you did not need to cast it to know the chest was both a mimic and was trapped.
Likewise for doors.
But some devious traps are in neither chests nor doors.

[RogueJK]

Perhaps it was created early in the game's development...

That's the main category of bad spells I've noticed -- perfectly reasonable spells for a different game (especially a lower power game).

I think that's a very reasonable explanation, and entirely likely - a vestige of an earlier design intent that was never cleaned up and wasn't really noticed in playtesting because it's "just" a cantrip.

[Darc_Vader]

Find trap is a very useful spell unless you are in a game were either traps are completely inexistent or a game where everything is trapped.
Yes I know it does nothing against chests because you did not need to cast it to know the chest was both a mimic and was trapped.
Likewise for doors.
But some devious traps are in neither chests nor doors.

The issue is that it doesn’t even tell you where the trap is; you just know there is a trap within 120 feet if it’s also in your line of sight (though you can sometimes intuit the location from knowing the general nature of the trap). The fact it doesn’t even work if the trap wasn’t specifically intended to be a trap is just insult to injury. I just don’t think it’s really ever going to be worth a second level slot unless you’re in a very specific type of campaign.

[noob]

The issue is that it doesn’t even tell you where the trap is; you just know there is a trap within 120 feet if it’s also in your line of sight (though you can sometimes intuit the location from knowing the general nature of the trap). The fact it doesn’t even work if the trap wasn’t specifically intended to be a trap is just insult to injury. I just don’t think it’s really ever going to be worth a second level slot unless you’re in a very specific type of campaign.

Just use a box to restrain your line of sight to be a cone for example and you know the direction of the traps.

[RogueJK]

Just use a box to restrain your line of sight to be a cone for example and you know the direction of the traps.

Burning a 2nd level slot for each "snapshot" just to know whether or not there are intentional traps (not even environmental hazards) somewhere vaguely in that direction, and having to burn further slots for each additional directional "snapshot"?

No thanks.

It's a terrible spell, no matter how you slice it.

[Darzil]

The issue is that it doesn’t even tell you where the trap is; you just know there is a trap within 120 feet if it’s also in your line of sight (though you can sometimes intuit the location from knowing the general nature of the trap). The fact it doesn’t even work if the trap wasn’t specifically intended to be a trap is just insult to injury. I just don’t think it’s really ever going to be worth a second level slot unless you’re in a very specific type of campaign.
Urgh. Reminds me of Ranger's Primeval Awareness, which detects certain foes within 1 mile (which is pretty unspecific) or within 5 miles in their favoured terrain (which is very unspecific!)

[RogueJK]

Exactly.

"Yep, there are traps somewhere within 120 feet" is just as useless as "Yep, there are enemies somewhere within 1 or 5 miles".

Paladins at least get locations with their Divine Sense.

Find Traps might have some niche use as a spammable Cantrip with its current wording, but not as a 2nd level spell.

[MaxWilson]

Exactly.

"Yep, there are traps somewhere within 120 feet" is just as useless as "Yep, there are enemies somewhere within 1 or 5 miles".

Paladins at least get locations with their Divine Sense.

Find Traps might have some niche use as a spammable Cantrip with its current wording, but not as a 2nd level spell.

Since Find Traps only detects traps within line of sight, not anywhere within 120 feet, you could theoretically do a binary search to narrow down location once you know that traps are present. It also gives you information on the kind of danger posed by the trap (falling, burning, poisoning, smashing, alerting) so you can take countermeasures. You might ignore a trap for "falling" but stop dead in your tracks or even turn around if you sense "disintegration."

The line of sight limitation is a hindrance as well (it means that there's no way to detect Glyphs of Warding on e.g. the far side of a doorjam), but Find Traps is NOT useless--protecting yourself and your wizard's tower against thieves gets much harder if you assume they can and will make use of Find Traps to detect and bypass/disable/spoof your nasty (Glyph of Warding: Wall of Force + Glyph of Warding: Cloudkill + Glyph of Warding: Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum (a.k.a. Teleport Block) + Glyph of Warding: Conjure Fire Elemental) traps.


Burning a 2nd level slot for each "snapshot" just to know whether or not there are intentional traps (not even environmental hazards) somewhere vaguely in that direction, and having to burn further slots for each additional directional "snapshot"?

No thanks.

It's a terrible spell, no matter how you slice it.

It depends entirely on whether the traps in question are traditional "fun" D&D puzzle traps meant to entertain players, or actual deadly traps meant to be keep an area secure against intruders by being utterly unfairly stacked against the intruder. If your DM is merely threatening you with 3d8 damage or something then yeah, a 2nd level spell slot isn't worth that. If it's 500d8 poison damage (over ten minutes) instead, maybe the 2nd level slot is worth it. It depends.

[Doug Lampert]

Exactly.

"Yep, there are traps somewhere within 120 feet" is just as useless as "Yep, there are enemies somewhere within 1 or 5 miles".

Paladins at least get locations with their Divine Sense.

Find Traps might have some niche use as a spammable Cantrip with its current wording, but not as a 2nd level spell.

As a spammable cantrip you could do the restricted vision snapshot trick suggested above and it actually works.

Ah Ah! It's a usable spell! You just need to be a level 18+ wizard and choose it as your level 2 Spell Mastery and for the LOW LOW COST of half your level 18 feature and a spell known and prepared you can have what would have been a very good niche ability in a trap heavy campaign if you could have gotten it at level 3-5 instead.

[NecessaryWeevil]

I feel that Control Weather might be underpowered, depending on what "Unbearable Heat" or "Arctic Cold" mean in mechanical terms.
I mean, yeah, it's an impressive feat to turn a warm, calm day into a blizzard, and certainly what I'd expect of a powerful druid in narrative terms,
but given that much D&D problem solving ends up at "kill the bad guys," I can't see picking it as my only 8th level spell very often.

[Ashrym]

I found primeval awareness more useful than find traps. See a grave, sense undead to make sure it's not a concern. Trying to evade detection while travelling and want to take a short rest, see of the area is clear. Want to make sure there's time for HiPS, check to see if the area is clear.

Knowing enemies aren't near has niche applicationsn because it demonstrates time is available for preparation, ritual casting, or resting.

Find traps can be used similarly if the party wants to move fast through a space because it quickly let's the group know the area is free from traps but needed the information with an immediate need to move is where it becomes very niche. Knock has the same issue where it rarely has a use over just picking locks or breaking things open.

Control weather seems underwhelming for an 8th-level spell but it's high because of the area it covers. It seems more useful reducing or exacerbating environment conditions that affect large numbers over time and definitely niche as well.

The theory behind truestrike is still worthwhile in campaigns where DM's or players have created spells with attack rolls, exists in the event more spells like that come out in official publication, and does exist for spells that increase damage cast in a higher slot for those times that might be worthwhile.

It's a bad cantrip but I wouldn't quite write it off.

A person can do a lot with glyph of warding spell glyphs given enough GP. That might be a bit much depending on the campaign.

[ImproperJustice]

Wait, you think prismatic wall should be level 5?

Maybe get bumped down to level 6-7.
I forgot that it can be selective with its offensive properties.

I would still prefer Wall of Thorns or Force to it and reserve the 9th level slot for something more amazing.

[MaxWilson]

As a spammable cantrip you could do the restricted vision snapshot trick suggested above and it actually works.

Ah Ah! It's a usable spell! You just need to be a level 18+ wizard and choose it as your level 2 Spell Mastery and for the LOW LOW COST of half your level 18 feature and a spell known and prepared you can have what would have been a very good niche ability in a trap heavy campaign if you could have gotten it at level 3-5 instead.

It's not a wizard spell, ineligible for Spell Mastery. Cleric/Druid/Ranger only.

On the plus side, this means that it's available whenever you need it at the cost of only a long rest--it's not like somebody in the party has to choose it for their spellbook.

[noob]

I found primeval awareness more useful than find traps. See a grave, sense undead to make sure it's not a concern. Trying to evade detection while travelling and want to take a short rest, see of the area is clear. Want to make sure there's time for HiPS, check to see if the area is clear.

Knowing enemies aren't near has niche applicationsn because it demonstrates time is available for preparation, ritual casting, or resting.

Find traps can be used similarly if the party wants to move fast through a space because it quickly let's the group know the area is free from traps but needed the information with an immediate need to move is where it becomes very niche. Knock has the same issue where it rarely has a use over just picking locks or breaking things open.

Control weather seems underwhelming for an 8th-level spell but it's high because of the area it covers. It seems more useful reducing or exacerbating environment conditions that affect large numbers over time and definitely niche as well.

The theory behind truestrike is still worthwhile in campaigns where DM's or players have created spells with attack rolls, exists in the event more spells like that come out in official publication, and does exist for spells that increase damage cast in a higher slot for those times that might be worthwhile.

It's a bad cantrip but I wouldn't quite write it off.

A person can do a lot with glyph of warding spell glyphs given enough GP. That might be a bit much depending on the campaign.

Control weather have an use in "fight an army" scenarios: some weather conditions makes projectile attacks harder and makes moving an army harder too.
What is useful is being able to cast it occasionally but it is rarely used because if you have to fight armies you will probably get some ridiculously helpful spells for that in two levels.

[stoutstien]

Storm of vengeance has always been disappointing to me. It's even hard to use on an NPC.

As for a low level spells Ray of enfeeblement bugs me.

[Pex]

Same.

Spend your Action this round, to get the chance to roll 2d20 on 1 attack roll next round, if you don't get hit and lose Concentration in the interim.

Or, just roll 1d20 this round and 1d20 next round, giving you the same 2d20 chance to hit, but potentially hitting with 2 attacks instead of just 1. Plus there's no Concentration needed, so no chance of losing the 2nd d20 and you can be Concentrating on something better.

(It gets even worse if you have Extra Attack, and you're giving up more than just 1d20 in the round that you use your action to cast True Strike.)


There might be some niche situational use for it, like on an Arcane Trickster who ends up in some uncommon situation where they don't have any other way to trigger Sneak Attack, and therefore a shot at 1 Sneak Attack every other round is potentially better than 1 regular Attack each round, but even then stuff like that is not going to be common enough to recommend wasting a cantrip selection on True Strike "just in case". (And besides, it'd still be hogging your Concentration.)

It has its use when not in combat where you need to make an attack roll for some reason but have all the time you need to "aim", i.e. cast True Strike. Trouble is such a situation doesn't happen often enough to be worth having the spell for all the greater time you aren't using it.

[noob]

As for a low level spells Ray of enfeeblement bugs me.

It used to have no save and no concentration in some previous editions.(and it still was an average spell)
It suffered from the "let us apply all the nerfs at once" phenomenon that did hit more than one average spell in order to turn them in bad spells(mordenkainen sword and weird have been hit by that club too)

[Amnestic]

As for a low level spells Ray of enfeeblement bugs me.

I wonder how far you'd need to buff it to make it 'viable'?
a) Remove concentration
b) Have it apply to dex weapon attacks too
c) Have it give disadvantage on concentration saves
d) All of the above?

[MaxWilson]

As for a low level spells Ray of enfeeblement bugs me.

It used to bug me more before I realized that the Con save only applies to round 2+. It's not a terrible spell to use against monsters with legendary resistance, e.g. adult dragons, astral dreadnoughts, though of course there's an opportunity cost too. I don't think I'd ever bother learning it, but if I had it anyway there are situations where I would prepare it.

[noob]

The historical reason why ray of enfeeblement was useful is that it used to reduce str directly which had many effects including making opponents that carry equipment possibly become overburdened, reducing damage and attack rolls at once, making opponents easier to grapple, shove and trip and so on.

[stoutstien]

It used to bug me more before I realized that the Con save only applies to round 2+. It's not a terrible spell to use against monsters with legendary resistance, e.g. adult dragons, astral dreadnoughts, though of course there's an opportunity cost too. I don't think I'd ever bother learning it, but if I had it anyway there are situations where I would prepare it.

If it didn't have concentration and only lasted until the start of the caster's next turn it actually would be better. If up Cast added additional targets it actually would be comparable to Tasha's mind whip. Well not quite.

[noob]

Wait I found one more way it was nerfed relatively to what it was in 3.5: its level was raised of one.
I think it is in competition with weird for "most nerfed spell"

[MaxWilson]

If it didn't have concentration and only lasted until the start of the caster's next turn it actually would be better. If up Cast added additional targets it actually would be comparable to Tasha's mind whip. Well not quite.

IMO it's more comparable to a mini Otto's Irresistible Dance.

[Witty Username]

Since Find Traps only detects traps within line of sight, not anywhere within 120 feet, you could theoretically do a binary search to narrow down location once you know that traps are present. It also gives you information on the kind of danger posed by the trap (falling, burning, poisoning, smashing, alerting) so you can take countermeasures. You might ignore a trap for "falling" but stop dead in your tracks or even turn around if you sense "disintegration."

The line of sight limitation is a hindrance as well (it means that there's no way to detect Glyphs of Warding on e.g. the far side of a doorjam), but Find Traps is NOT useless--protecting yourself and your wizard's tower against thieves gets much harder if you assume they can and will make use of Find Traps to detect and bypass/disable/spoof your nasty (Glyph of Warding: Wall of Force + Glyph of Warding: Cloudkill + Glyph of Warding: Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum (a.k.a. Teleport Block) + Glyph of Warding: Conjure Fire Elemental) traps.



It depends entirely on whether the traps in question are traditional "fun" D&D puzzle traps meant to entertain players, or actual deadly traps meant to be keep an area secure against intruders by being utterly unfairly stacked against the intruder. If your DM is merely threatening you with 3d8 damage or something then yeah, a 2nd level spell slot isn't worth that. If it's 500d8 poison damage (over ten minutes) instead, maybe the 2nd level slot is worth it. It depends.

Couldn't you do most of that with a 10-ft pole instead of a second level spell?

On that note continual flame in under powered simply because the light cantrip exists.

[Jerrykhor]

There's generally more UP spells than OP ones. I'll start with UP first.

Cantrips: True Strike, Bladeward
Level 1: Witchbolt, Searing Smite, Jump
Level 2: Enthrall, Find Traps
Level 3: Flame arrows
Level 4: Confusion, Stoneskin
Level 5: Immolation
Level 6: Investiture of Stone
Level 7: Mordenkainens Sword
Level 8: Abi-dalzims horrid wilting
Level 9: Weird, Storm of vengeance

OP
Fireball, Wall of Force, Simulacrum

[Pex]

Fireball is overpowered on purpose and by admission. It's a treat for players being so iconic. It answers the question in the affirmative technically, but there shouldn't be any stigma about it being overpowered.

[Jerrykhor]

Fireball is overpowered on purpose and by admission. It's a treat for players being so iconic. It answers the question in the affirmative technically, but there shouldn't be any stigma about it being overpowered.

True, i was thinking if i should put it in. Its OP, but probably not 'worst balanced' OP.

[Necromas]

While it's true that many people don't think about this, try to make a list of High Level spells that require attack rolls. It would need to deal more damage than 4d10 at level 5, 6d10 at level 11, and 8d10 at level 17. In order to outdo casting two fire bolts.

There are literally no attack roll spells other than inflict wounds, or chromatic orb at levels 3 and 4, that can do more damage than two firebolts with one attack roll. All of the ones that can do high amounts of damage rely on making consecutive hits.

And really you would have to look at the average damage of casting firebolt + whatever else you would have done with that spell slot, or you're comparing a resource heavy attack vs a no resource attack.

[PhoenixPhyre]

There are literally no attack roll spells other than inflict wounds, or chromatic orb at levels 3 and 4, that can do more damage than two firebolts with one attack roll. All of the ones that can do high amounts of damage rely on making consecutive hits.

And really you would have to look at the average damage of casting firebolt + whatever else you would have done with that spell slot, or you're comparing a resource heavy attack vs a no resource attack.

I know you meant ones that a wizard could get, but guiding bolt. 4d6 averages 14 to paired firebolts' 11 (at those levels). And with a better damage type and granting advantage on the next attack.

[Ashrym]

It's not a wizard spell, ineligible for Spell Mastery. Cleric/Druid/Ranger only.

On the plus side, this means that it's available whenever you need it at the cost of only a long rest--it's not like somebody in the party has to choose it for their spellbook.

The PC can add it to the wizard list. Mark of Detection dragon mark would add it to the wizard list. It's the same mechanic for unlimited wizard healing via dragon marked rules and spell mastery.

[Chaosmancer]

I'll agree with Find Traps.

Daylight also is on my list as being underpowered. It is only useful for ending magical darkness. Which I could just use Dispel magic for and not have this useless "very bright light" spell.


There are a lot of high level spells like Storm of Vengeance and Earthquake that are basically useless. I mean, sure, if you want to wreck a city block or something, you can find uses for them. But in 90% of all campaigns, they aren't worth having.

Phantasmal Killer and Weird are just insultingly bad. Weird can at least maybe get better if you go with the "sourceless fear" interpreation, but it still isn't worth a 9th level spell. Same with Tenser's Transformation.

Stoneskin and Barkskin, and a bunch of other Ranger spells.


Oh, right. Meld into Stone. Can anyone tell me anything that this spell is good for? You can't see or hear out of the stone, so... what's the point? Just hide in a wall til you think it is safe to come out?

[Jerrykhor]

Oh, right. Meld into Stone. Can anyone tell me anything that this spell is good for? You can't see or hear out of the stone, so... what's the point? Just hide in a wall til you think it is safe to come out?

When you absolutely have to win that game of Hide-and-Seek, Meld into Stone is golden. Also, its basically a Do Not Disturb for a full long rest, though your party members might get annoyed if they get attacked during that long rest while you get a good nights sleep.

[noob]

Jump



How is jump underpowered?
It is the only way to increase the ability to go above gaps in a reasonable time at low levels.(Yes you could spam stone shape to make a bridge but it takes a lot of time and not everybody carries 3 ladders to go over gaps)

[Galithar]

There are literally no attack roll spells other than inflict wounds, or chromatic orb at levels 3 and 4, that can do more damage than two firebolts with one attack roll. All of the ones that can do high amounts of damage rely on making consecutive hits.

And really you would have to look at the average damage of casting firebolt + whatever else you would have done with that spell slot, or you're comparing a resource heavy attack vs a no resource attack.

Comparing resource heavy to no resource was my intent though. If it can't pass the litmus test of being superior to a non-resource action it is clearly and definitively under powered.

If we had a level 9 spell that dealt 40d10 damage on an attack roll with a -5 to hit then True Strike would have a niche. Trying to give that one off attack a better chance to hit. Not only does a nuclear attack roll option not exist, the spell can't even outdo two rounds of high damage cantrips in 95+% of situations.

Edit: Increased damage of my example as it was so far under the damage of other level 9 spells that it still didn't give True Strike a niche.

[Asisreo1]

Comparing resource heavy to no resource was my intent though. If it can't pass the litmus test of being superior to a non-resource action it is clearly and definitively under powered.

If we had a level 9 spell that dealt 40d10 damage on an attack roll with a -5 to hit then True Strike would have a niche. Trying to give that one off attack a better chance to hit. Not only does a nuclear attack roll option not exist, the spell can't even outdo two rounds of high damage cantrips in 95+% of situations.

Edit: Increased damage of my example as it was so far under the damage of other level 9 spells that it still didn't give True Strike a niche.
The benefit of attack roll spells, and the most likely reason they're rare, is because they are able to bypass the one thing that makes spellcaster damage much harder to apply at any given time.

Magic Resistance. At higher levels, I suspect more monsters encountered will have either Magic Resistance or high saving throws or both. In these cases, attack roll spells may simply be more powerful than saving throw spells, even if its just an upcasted version.


Chromatic Orb outpowers double firebolt, but in certain circumstances.

From levels 1-4, Chromatic Orb can do either 13.5 damage or 18 damage compared to the 11 firebolt damage. The second level version is significantly stronger and may be worth the spell slot, though its rare for a magic resistant monster to appear at this level. Now, if you compare it to firebolt+2nd-level magic missile, that's 18.5 and not that much more powerful. Compared to firebolt and scorching ray, that's 26.5 which is that much better. Of course, fire resistant enemies change this significantly and Chromatic Orb overtakes again, but most 1-4 levels don't have to worry about that. This trend continues past level 3, where chromatic orb is the only attack roll leveled spell that can bypass fire resistance on an arcane caster's spell list, keep this in mind.

At level 5, Chromatic Orb does 22.5 damage compared to 22 firebolt and is barely better. Not at all worth the 3rd-level slot. However, from levels 7-10, Chromatic Orb does 27:22 or 31.5:22 which can be significant again.

At level 11, Chromatic Orb does 36 versus 33, it somehow widened the gap again, though not by enough to warrant a 6th-level slot unless resistances factored in. From levels 13-16, the power of Chromatic Orb increases to 40.5:33, 45:33.

At level 17, though I highly doubt a spellcaster would do this, Chromatic Orb does 49.5 damage. Firebolt does 44 damage. Not worth the 9th level slot, but does more damage than firebolt and bypasses Magic and Fire resistance, which are likely resistances at this level.

Besides, the worst spell in the entire game is Weird, bar none. Its a 9th-level spell slot for an AoE Phantasmal Killer? Nope. Horrible. That spell is only for DM-NPC's. All PC's should steer clear of it.

[Gignere]

There's generally more UP spells than OP ones. I'll start with UP first.

Cantrips: True Strike, Bladeward
Level 1: Witchbolt, Searing Smite, Jump
Level 2: Enthrall, Find Traps
Level 3: Flame arrows
Level 4: Confusion, Stoneskin
Level 5: Immolation
Level 6: Investiture of Stone
Level 7: Mordenkainens Sword
Level 8: Abi-dalzims horrid wilting
Level 9: Weird, Storm of vengeance

OP
Fireball, Wall of Force, Simulacrum

Bladeward is great for gish sorcerers, EKs and the new BS. EKs can still bonus action attack while gaining resistance to B/P/S. For BS they can now at level 6+ just attack and bladeward, to greatly increase their EHP and frontline durability really turning them into a full Gish. Sorcerers can quicken it and still allow for your action.

AT’s can use it and it stacks with uncanny dodge and can allow them to take 1/4 damage against single attack hard hitting monsters.

[Galithar]

Snip...

I don't disagree that Weird is not a good spell, but it us orders of magnitude better than True Strike. While True Strike has a MINOR benefit of use on Chromatic Orb upcast its very likely that Weird still has a greater impact on a combat.

Best case scenario for Chromatic Orb is avoiding an elemental resistance and hitting a weakness. True Strike gives advantage to that attack roll. (Which could also be gained in many many other ways) that would be 11d8 or 49 average damage. Doubled to 98 if you manage to target a weakness. That's respectable damage for 2 turns, but still pales compared to using the level 9 slot on a better spell.

Weird on the other hand has the potential of frightening and damaging around 28 creatures. Now that's an unreasonable situation so let's tone that down. Let's say we could hit 10 creatures. Completely reasonable for a 30' radius in my book. A Wizard of that Level with no magic items should have a DC of at least 19. Assuming enemies with a decent Wisdom save of +9 to give a 50% success rate. That means turn 1 5 are hit and frightened. This gives them disadvantage on almost everything they do on their turn. Then half of them fail again. Rounding down is 8d10 up is 12d10. Damage isn't great but the frighten is decent.

That's a comparison of 1 action vs 2 actions and with much more favorable conditions for TS and Chromatic O combo. Weird still sucks, but it's also still better than TS in its ideal condition. Use weird with DC boosting items or against low Wis save enemies and it is an encounter ender. Again, there are better spells at that level, but it's far from the worst spell.

Though I'm questioning why I'm spending so much time debating the degree to which these spells suck lol

[ImproperJustice]

Jump doesn’t need concentration so it’s an odd but handy niche mobility booster for EKs, Magic Initiate Anime Fighters, and Warlocks.

Immolation gets a lot of hate. But I got a lot of use out of it against heavy armor/ giant types with low dex.
It’s verbal only, and single target only which makes it oddly useful when grappling or against someone grappling a team mate since restrained foes auto fail
Dex saves.

But otherwise I generally agree with Jerykhore’s list.

[Keravath]

Wall of Force.

Completely trivializes 75% of the monster manual, especially in the hands of clever players. It should be much higher in level than it is.

Honestly, it should swap places with Prismatic Wall.

I think it is a good spell. However, if it "completely trivializes 75% of the monster manual" then it is issue is with the DM for the encounter design and not on the player or the game for containing this one spell.

I've played characters with Wall of Force, Animate Objects, Hypnotic Pattern, Counterspell and in the correct circumstances they can all be very useful ... against a perfect setup they can be encounter changing. However, "the perfect setup" is due to the DM creating the situation where the spells will shine and allowing the players that moment of brilliance ... it isn't about the spells being "OP".

Though all spells are not created equal and if you want to define OP as more useful or versatile then Wall of Force, Animate Objects, Hypnotic Pattern, Counterspell and others certainly qualify.

[Darthnazrael]

On that note continual flame in under powered simply because the light cantrip exists.
A 3rd level Continual Flame is an always-on Dispel for the Darkness spell, which is not nothing.

[Witty Username]

One of the big problems with attack roll spells is they are single target, except for scorching ray, obligating them to fall behind other spell casting options. Bypassing magic resistance is much easier with terrain spells, bluffs, and in latter game large enough damage numbers that it doesn't matter much. Meteor swarm deals 70 damage on average if they succeed on their save for example.

[nickl_2000]

On that note continual flame in under powered simply because the light cantrip exists.

Wow, I couldn't disagree with this more. Many classes don't have access to the light cantrip to begin with, and need both their hands for combat. The ones that do have access to the cantrips are limited in the amount of cantrips and they can only light one item at a time. This spell, on it's own, can light as many objects as you like, until dispelled. You don't need to worry about duration, you don't need to worry about one at a time, it works underwater, and it can easily be covered. For every single non-darkvision class I have ever had I got this spell cast by a PC or NPC because it is that awesome.

[ImproperJustice]

I think it is a good spell. However, if it "completely trivializes 75% of the monster manual" then it is issue is with the DM for the encounter design and not on the player or the game for containing this one spell.

I've played characters with Wall of Force, Animate Objects, Hypnotic Pattern, Counterspell and in the correct circumstances they can all be very useful ... against a perfect setup they can be encounter changing. However, "the perfect setup" is due to the DM creating the situation where the spells will shine and allowing the players that moment of brilliance ... it isn't about the spells being "OP".

Though all spells are not created equal and if you want to define OP as more useful or versatile then Wall of Force, Animate Objects, Hypnotic Pattern, Counterspell and others certainly qualify.

Yes. If a GM runs a world where walls, ceilings, or floors don’t exist AND every creature is larger than 10’, or has the ability to teleport, or cast Disintegrate then Wall of Force would be very UP.
Outside of such an environment, the spell is extremely overpowered and should be a 9th level spell.

Using your examples:
Hypnotic Pattern allows a save or immunity.
Animated Objects can be destroyed with AOE damage or effort or confined by a Wall of Force.
Wall of Force has a range of 120’ vs. Counterspells 60’, meaning that it may not be sufficient to stop it, and unless you have loaded a 5th slot for that Counterspell it is not guaranteed.

I recognize your point about encounter design, and apologize for being Snarky. It’s just that to accommodate challenging encounters for Wall of Force users I think it requires some above average work compared to other spells of a similar level.
Which is why I have such strong feelings about it being overpowered.

[Asisreo1]

Yes. If a GM runs a world where walls, ceilings, or floors don’t exist AND every creature is larger than 10’, or has the ability to teleport, or cast Disintegrate then Wall of Force would be very UP.
Outside of such an environment, the spell is extremely overpowered and should be a 9th level spell.

Do not discount the fact that the time they're able to cast this is at 9th level. This means they can walk through Treants, Young Blue Dragons, and Nyacaloths roughly 6 times before needing a break. These are already powerful creatures with a few options.

If they're fighting enemies of less power, they're more numerous which makes concentration harder to maintain.

Even an archmage, arcanaloth, or erinyes aren't "deadly" to these groups of adventurers. Any encounter not around the deadliness of Adult Dragons, Rakshasas, and Beholders are probably going to be much easier with a Wall of Force.


Also, a large creature is unable to fit inside a hemisphere of 10ft. Put a 10ft hemisphere over a 10ft cube and you'll see why.

[Dr. Cliché]

The other UP category I've noticed is mind-affecting Enchantment spells other than suggestion. Having the opponent automatically realize they've been charmed after the fact might be necessary to stop some specific PC shenanigans, but it effectively made most of those spells unusable in many situations (barring you using Disguise Self first, so they know they've been charmed, but mistake who did it).

I think that's only half the problem to be honest.

This drawback could actually be a reasonable trade-off . . . if the Charm spells didn't universally suck at their sole purpose.

The main problem is that most of them centre around the Charmed condition - which is probably the worst thought-out condition in the entire game. Advantage on checks to interact with the creature is pretty damn weak, especially when Charm Person, say, only makes it regard you as a friendly acquaintance (compared to the previous version, where they regarded you as a trusted friend and ally and interpreted your words in the most favourable way possible).

To be clear, I'd be fine with the spell being relatively weak, if it didn't also have the massive drawback of the target immediately knowing afterwards that you mind-controlled it.

And then you've got joys like Dominate Person. What is even supposed to be the point of this spell? It has a duration of just 1 minute (with Concentration, because of course it's a bloody Concentration spell), which would heavily imply that it's supposed to be for combat. Okay, I guess that makes sense. Oh, but if my allies or I are hostile towards it then it gets Advantage on its save to resist. And then if I want it to attack on our behalf, it gets to save again every time it takes damage - even if the damage is coming from our enemies. Why would you even bother?

And if you want to use it as a non-combat spell then I hope you're prepared to upcast the hell out of it. Because you need to use a 7th level spell slot for a mere hour of control, and even an 8th level slot doesn't get you a full day's worth. Also, if you want the subject to do anything more complicated than the sort of tricks a trained monkey could perform, I hope you're happy to just stand stock still doing bugger all else for the entire duration.

I get that these spells can be powerful, but if you're going to make them this useless then why bother including them at all?

[Chaosmancer]

How is jump underpowered?
It is the only way to increase the ability to go above gaps in a reasonable time at low levels.(Yes you could spam stone shape to make a bridge but it takes a lot of time and not everybody carries 3 ladders to go over gaps)

But you do have 50 ft of rope right? And if you are dealing with a 30 to 40 ft gap, you are generally dealing with a chasm, so you can make a loop and throw it around an anchor point and make a rope crossing. As long as you have time, you can make it work.

So, Jump is only really needed when you have a gap over 20 ft, with smooth surfaces on the other side that you can't get a rope around. Which makes it very niche.

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I think that's only half the problem to be honest.

This drawback could actually be a reasonable trade-off . . . if the Charm spells didn't universally suck at their sole purpose.

The main problem is that most of them centre around the Charmed condition - which is probably the worst thought-out condition in the entire game. Advantage on checks to interact with the creature is pretty damn weak, especially when Charm Person, say, only makes it regard you as a friendly acquaintance (compared to the previous version, where they regarded you as a trusted friend and ally and interpreted your words in the most favourable way possible).

To be clear, I'd be fine with the spell being relatively weak, if it didn't also have the massive drawback of the target immediately knowing afterwards that you mind-controlled it.

And then you've got joys like Dominate Person. What is even supposed to be the point of this spell? It has a duration of just 1 minute (with Concentration, because of course it's a bloody Concentration spell), which would heavily imply that it's supposed to be for combat. Okay, I guess that makes sense. Oh, but if my allies or I are hostile towards it then it gets Advantage on its save to resist. And then if I want it to attack on our behalf, it gets to save again every time it takes damage - even if the damage is coming from our enemies. Why would you even bother?

And if you want to use it as a non-combat spell then I hope you're prepared to upcast the hell out of it. Because you need to use a 7th level spell slot for a mere hour of control, and even an 8th level slot doesn't get you a full day's worth. Also, if you want the subject to do anything more complicated than the sort of tricks a trained monkey could perform, I hope you're happy to just stand stock still doing bugger all else for the entire duration.

I get that these spells can be powerful, but if you're going to make them this useless then why bother including them at all?


I tend to agree. The charmed condition is far weaker than I think was originally designed, because many times it is handed out and assumed to actually do something.

[Dr. Cliché]

But you do have 50 ft of rope right? And if you are dealing with a 30 to 40 ft gap, you are generally dealing with a chasm, so you can make a loop and throw it around an anchor point and make a rope crossing. As long as you have time, you can make it work.

So, Jump is only really needed when you have a gap over 20 ft, with smooth surfaces on the other side that you can't get a rope around. Which makes it very niche.

I really want to like Jump but the effect is pretty weak.

Maybe if it was just a Bonus Action to cast? Or if it lasted an hour rather than a minute? It would still be niche but at least you could either cast it without wasting your action or else enjoy it for a lot longer.

Also, it's hilarious to me that Jump gives you no protection from fall damage.

"I can jump three times as high as normal - watch this!"
*CRACK*
"Oh god, my legs!"



I tend to agree. The charmed condition is far weaker than I think was originally designed, because many times it is handed out and assumed to actually do something.

I wonder if it was originally more like the Vampire version?

[noob]

But you do have 50 ft of rope right? And if you are dealing with a 30 to 40 ft gap, you are generally dealing with a chasm, so you can make a loop and throw it around an anchor point and make a rope crossing. As long as you have time, you can make it work.

So, Jump is only really needed when you have a gap over 20 ft, with smooth surfaces on the other side that you can't get a rope around. Which makes it very niche.

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I tend to agree. The charmed condition is far weaker than I think was originally designed, because many times it is handed out and assumed to actually do something.
so you are mid fight and you say to the goblin stabbing you "hey let me get my rope from my bag" then you get the rope from your bag while being stabbed then you throw it at the other side while being stabbed then if you are lucky and that it caught something on the other side you attach it to your side while being stabbed then you start crossing thanks to the rope and the goblin cuts it and you fall.
That is why people prefers jump in the condition I have indicated: "when you have to cross a gap in a reasonable time" and 18 seconds is not reasonable while 6 seconds is (cast then jump for jumps that do not need a running start while using the jump spell).

[Bilbron]

It has its use when not in combat where you need to make an attack roll for some reason but have all the time you need to "aim", i.e. cast True Strike. Trouble is such a situation doesn't happen often enough to be worth having the spell for all the greater time you aren't using it.Might want to use it if setting up a high-level attack roll spell like Disintigrate.

[Dr. Cliché]

Might want to use it if setting up a high-level attack roll spell like Disintigrate.

Disintegrate isn't an attack roll. :smalltongue:

[Bilbron]

Disintegrate isn't an attack roll. :smalltongue:Yikes, I suck, lol.


As for a low level spells Ray of enfeeblement bugs me.I can see it being useful as a no-save, minimum 1 round 50% damage reduction from a big hitter. 2nd level spell that blocks like 30 damage or something can be useful, I guess, though tough to choose this one in preps based on opportunity cost.

[Edea]

Simulacrum is ridiculous. It grants the wizard a bonus 8th and 9th level slot (to say nothing of the lower-level slots generated) and makes wish usable without any penalty whatsoever. That thing needs a thorough nerfing, but they won't bother because it's not available 'when' most games are played.

[Bilbron]

Wow, I couldn't disagree with this more. Many classes don't have access to the light cantrip to begin with, and need both their hands for combat. The ones that do have access to the cantrips are limited in the amount of cantrips and they can only light one item at a time. This spell, on it's own, can light as many objects as you like, until dispelled. You don't need to worry about duration, you don't need to worry about one at a time, it works underwater, and it can easily be covered. For every single non-darkvision class I have ever had I got this spell cast by a PC or NPC because it is that awesome.Upcast Continual Flame can defeat Darkness spell.

[stoutstien]

I can see it being useful as a no-save, minimum 1 round 50% damage reduction from a big hitter. 2nd level spell that blocks like 30 damage or something can be useful, I guess, though tough to choose this one in preps based on opportunity cost.

Concentration and needing to land a spell attack makes it just hard to use. If one or the other was removed it would be a solution Debuff option.

[Doug Lampert]

Simulacrum is ridiculous. It grants the wizard a bonus 8th and 9th level slot (to say nothing of the lower-level slots generated) and makes wish usable without any penalty whatsoever. That thing needs a thorough nerfing, but they won't bother because it's not available 'when' most games are played.

Third edition: High levels were unplayably badly balanced IMAO. Most campaigns ended about the time 5-6th level spells were on line, in my experience the only way to make them work was either all full casters, or nothing more than half casters. And they didn't fix it because "no one plays at high level".

Fourth edition: They completely screwed up monster damage for levels beyond heroic tier (technically, the screwup started at level 3, but it wasn't really noticeable till paragon tier), screwed up the player's attack bonuses for those levels vs. monster AC, with the joint effect that high level combat became many round slogs with both sides armed with nerf bats and they did not bother to fix any of this for something like the first three years despite both being simple numerical fixes. Their excuse was "no one plays at high level".

Fifth edition: Simulacrum is totally broken, especially when combined with wish (wish is fine, they actually got it more or less right, but Wish+Simulacrum is horrid because each spell takes the significant limits off the other and Simulacrum is horribly overpowered even with the limits). The various capstones are all over the place from nearly useless to LoL overpowered, and they aren't fixing it because "no one plays at high level".

Gee WotC, do you think maybe the reason "no one plays at high level" is because you don't bother to put any design effort or playtesting into high level play and don't errata even the most obvious screwups and high level play DOES NOT WORK as a direct consequence?

[MaxWilson]

Couldn't you do most of that with a 10-ft pole instead of a second level spell?

I don't see how a 10' pole helps against magical as opposed to mechanical traps.

(Well, I guess a pole and a mirror can let you examine the far side of door jams actually. But it doesn't replace Find Traps, much less Find Traps + Augury.)


Also, a large creature is unable to fit inside a hemisphere of 10ft. Put a 10ft hemisphere over a 10ft cube and you'll see why.

Wall of Force can have a diameter up to 20'.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Wall of Force can have a diameter up to 20'.

But putting a 10' radius sphere centered at ground level doesn't actually (in real-world geometry anyway) cover a 10' cube with a face on the ground.

IMO, that matters not at all, because D&D!geometry is not real-world geometry. And you could center it a foot or two above the ground to give you the extra clearance if you really need it.

So yeah, you're right.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Bless
Maybe it's not overpowered, but I think it might be the most under rated. It's about the only 1st level buff that gets used by our group regularly into tier 2 and 3. Even supposed class defining spell like Hunter's Mark or Hex just aren't as good as being able to improve 3 of your group's hits and saves. With this on the martials can more reliably take SS and GWM penalty and get the +10 bonus. The rest of the party might not have to huddle around the Paladin in fireball formation and if they do a lot of saves become auto-saves.
It doesn't overwhelm with one big result, but it moves the needle on so many parts of combat.

Pass Without Trace
You've just turned your party into a bunch of assassins. And the duration is great, so you can explore a large part of a dungeon under one spell.

[Asisreo1]

But putting a 10' radius sphere centered at ground level doesn't actually (in real-world geometry anyway) cover a 10' cube with a face on the ground.

IMO, that matters not at all, because D&D!geometry is not real-world geometry. And you could center it a foot or two above the ground to give you the extra clearance if you really need it.

So yeah, you're right.
If a DM buffs a spell beyond its intended purpose, then turns around and calls it unbalanced, it would be at least worth discussing whether this power is brought about by the buff.

Naturally, the question of whether a dome has a bottom to it, making it obsolete to even lift the spell, comes about.

I'll assume there's no bottom, though.

This grants the enemy cover, but effects can still move between the gap created by the spell. This allows a spellcaster to cast a spell into the area, but it also allows the target to use its effects as well.

The amount of spells the spellcaster can cast is limited to nonconcentration spells.

[PhoenixPhyre]

If a DM buffs a spell beyond its intended purpose, then turns around and calls it unbalanced, it would be at least worth discussing whether this power is brought about by the buff.

Naturally, the question of whether a dome has a bottom to it, making it obsolete to even lift the spell, comes about.

I'll assume there's no bottom, though.

This grants the enemy cover, but effects can still move between the gap created by the spell. This allows a spellcaster to cast a spell into the area, but it also allows the target to use its effects as well.

The amount of spells the spellcaster can cast is limited to nonconcentration spells.

I forgot it's a dome, not a sphere. So yeah. No centering it above the ground if you want it to work right.

I'm still not going to care about the geometric issue, because in a world where diagonals don't cost extra, then cubes are spheres and vice versa. And creatures don't occupy their entire space, they only control it.

[AvatarVecna]

True Strike is weak, and it didn't have to be. There is a +1d4 to a single save cantrip, and a +1d4 to a single check cantrip. Why not make True Strike a +1d4 cantrip? And then, True Strike should be viewed as a combat cantrip, and should improve in usefulness as you level. Maybe the die size increases, maybe it lasts for additional blows.

Instead, True Strike is objectively worse than attacking twice in most situations, and in the occasional "I don't wanna waste this high-level slot making a spell attack just to roll a 1" moments, there are more efficient ways to get advantage to the attack roll than spending an action and your concentration in the previous round. And that's ignoring the fact that a lot of costly spells that require you to make an attack roll suck, and having Advantage on the attack roll doesn't make them stop sucking.

[Keravath]

Yes. If a GM runs a world where walls, ceilings, or floors don’t exist AND every creature is larger than 10’, or has the ability to teleport, or cast Disintegrate then Wall of Force would be very UP.
Outside of such an environment, the spell is extremely overpowered and should be a 9th level spell.

Using your examples:
Hypnotic Pattern allows a save or immunity.
Animated Objects can be destroyed with AOE damage or effort or confined by a Wall of Force.
Wall of Force has a range of 120’ vs. Counterspells 60’, meaning that it may not be sufficient to stop it, and unless you have loaded a 5th slot for that Counterspell it is not guaranteed.

I recognize your point about encounter design, and apologize for being Snarky. It’s just that to accommodate challenging encounters for Wall of Force users I think it requires some above average work compared to other spells of a similar level.
Which is why I have such strong feelings about it being overpowered.

I can understand being Snarky, everyone has things that they find particularly irritating.

The odd thing here though is that I have played characters with wall of force (lore bard/2 warlock to level 16 so far, 9th level evoker wizard/1 knowledge cleric) as well as played games where other characters used wall of force and it really hasn't wrecked any of the encounters I've played in. Certainly nothing that would require it to be a 9th level spell.

Wall of force can be a sphere, dome or wall. This usually means it can isolate/control one target or split an opposing group into two sections which might be able to be dealt with separately. This also assumes that there are no enemy spellcasters with disintegrate who could destroy the wall instantly or others with the ability to teleport. The encounter doesn't require every opponent with the ability to teleport - but even a couple will mitigate the effectiveness of the wall in breaking up a group.

There ARE collections of creatures whose attacks are primarily either melee or ranged which will more vulnerable to wall of force tactics that block their attacks and split their groups leaving them with no options but to wait. In addition, a wall of force can be surprisingly effective against dragons (unless you play with the variants where powerful dragons are also spell casters).

So a DM does need to be aware of these constraints when building encounters but overall, in the encounters I have played, Wall of Force has been useful but not a particularly overpowered form of crowd control.

I'm just wondering what experiences you have had that give such a different impression on the power of Wall of Force.

Don't get me wrong, it is a great spell with immense versatility and usefulness in many situations (I've used it as a bridge, to contain a single creature and to split an opposing force in two among other things), it is definitely one of the better spells, but it seems fine to me as a 5th level spell.

Note: On the other hand, my list of "overpowered" spells is also pretty short and usually has to do with cheesy things like abuse of Simulacrum.


P.S. There are also some rules variations that may come into play when using Wall of Force (and may affect the perceived power of the spell) - some folks consider Wall of Force to provide total cover and others do not - which affects casting spells on target you can see on the other side of a wall of force.

[Jerrykhor]

How is jump underpowered?
It is the only way to increase the ability to go above gaps in a reasonable time at low levels.(Yes you could spam stone shape to make a bridge but it takes a lot of time and not everybody carries 3 ladders to go over gaps)

Because Jump IS trash. Its only effective if you have decent Strength to begin with. The typical caster that has 8 strength can high jump 2ft without Jump, and 6 ft with it. If you have 20 strength, you can jump 8ft without and 24 ft with it.

Its no use pointing out the problems jump can solve if it doesn't solve it for the whole party. So that fighter now can jump over a chasm that wasn't very wide to begin with, yay. What about the rest of the party? Feather Fall would suck if it only saves 1 target from falling to its death, and even then its still better than Jump because its still 1 life saved. On the other hand, you don't need Jump. Even if Jump did affect the whole party, the fact that it gives varying benefits means it might not solve the same problem for everyone.

But the main kicker is, even if you did want to maximize your jump distance, you cannot jump more than your speed. Its stupid as hell, because you need a 10ft running start to jump higher, but once you minus it from your base speed, theres not much distance left to jump.
Heck, warlocks can take an invocation that allows them to Jump AT WILL, and they still think its trash. Because it is.

[Chaosmancer]

so you are mid fight and you say to the goblin stabbing you "hey let me get my rope from my bag" then you get the rope from your bag while being stabbed then you throw it at the other side while being stabbed then if you are lucky and that it caught something on the other side you attach it to your side while being stabbed then you start crossing thanks to the rope and the goblin cuts it and you fall.
That is why people prefers jump in the condition I have indicated: "when you have to cross a gap in a reasonable time" and 18 seconds is not reasonable while 6 seconds is (cast then jump for jumps that do not need a running start while using the jump spell).

Um...

Why are you trying to cross the chasm before killing the goblin? If a "reasonable amount of time" is a single turn in combat, now we have to ask why you need to cross this chasm mid combat, instead of dealing with the immediate threats.

My version would be to kill the goblin, instead of using my action, running and jumping and taking an attack of opportunity.

[Thunderous Mojo]

There are a lot of high level spells like Storm of Vengeance and Earthquake that are basically useless. I mean, sure, if you want to wreck a city block or something, you can find uses for them. But in 90% of all campaigns, they aren't worth having.
People that live in California appreciate the Earthquake spell, a bit more than you. 😁
An Earthquake spell can destroy a Daern's Instant Fortress in 2 rounds.

At 50 points of damage per round to buildings, the Earthquake spell essentially is dealing the maximum hit point amount for a 10' cube of stone wall.

The Roman conquest of Albion would have gone quite differently in a world where the inhabitants have access to this spell. Hadrian's Wall becomes Hadrian's Rubble pile.


Oh, right. Meld into Stone. Can anyone tell me anything that this spell is good for? You can't see or hear out of the stone, so... what's the point? Just hide in a wall til you think it is safe to come out?
Yep. In the past the spell was used for self healing/buffing.

It also is a spell of last resort. If the party is in for an imminent TPK, the Cleric and Druid can use this to ensure they can survive and be on "corpse handling duties".

Now that a Druid may be able to use TCoE to summon a Familiar...using the Familiar as a drone based touch spell delivery service, might be valuable.


Because Jump IS trash. Its only effective if you have decent Strength to begin with. .

A 10 STR character can take the Dash action and jump 30' horizontally. The same character can now High Jump 10' once arm reach is accounted for. That is enough to get out of a simple pit....or a Carbonite Freezing Chamber.

[Jerrykhor]

A 10 STR character can take the Dash action and jump 30' horizontally. The same character can now High Jump 10' once arm reach is accounted for. That is enough to get out of a simple pit....or a Carbonite Freezing Chamber.

Or you can use a rope and pull him out. If the character who fell into the pit has Jump spell, great. But if he does not, you can't cast it on him anyway, because Jump is a touch spell. If 2 or more people fell into the pit, Jump can only get 1 of them out.

Why do you need Jump again?

[MrCharlie]

Most overpowered spell? Healing spirit. To my knowledge, it's the only spell which has been specifically and intentionally nerfed. The SCAG cantrips were changed, but I don't view them as an intentional nerf. Healing spirit was simply butchered-deservingly.

Most underpowered spell? There are several, but I'll vote Weird because it's 9th level and terrible, as opposed to lower level spells which are worthless. This might be controversial because Weird at least imposes fear, but being only situationally better than a 3rd level spell (the Fear spell itself) at 9th level is an awful place to be.

[Asisreo1]

I forgot it's a dome, not a sphere. So yeah. No centering it above the ground if you want it to work right.

I'm still not going to care about the geometric issue, because in a world where diagonals don't cost extra, then cubes are spheres and vice versa. And creatures don't occupy their entire space, they only control it.
A creature doesn't have to occupy the entire space. The spell says it pushes you out if the wall intersects with a creature's space so even if it doesn't physically occupy the full space.

[PhoenixPhyre]

A creature doesn't have to occupy the entire space. The spell says it pushes you out if the wall intersects with a creature's space so even if it doesn't physically occupy the full space.

On that note, there's a strong level of undefined-ness with the 3rd dimension. Are "spaces" cubes? In that case, a giant takes up more than a Huge space (15x15x15)--most of them are well over 15' tall and they don't hunch. Are spaces of indefinite height? Then having someone flying overhead gets squiffy.

I'd not be concerned, personally, about a DM ruling that it does/does not push you out if it intersects your vertical space. Either way goes. And it's unlikely to affect a Large creature's horizontal space (centered at the center of the creature's footprint and you're fine.

I've never seen how this spell is so encounter-breaking in either reading--

It works well against strong-duo encounters, allowing defeat in detail. But so do a lot of other spells. Against creatures who are conveniently arranged and none of your people are engaged, you can lock away a bunch. If the terrain permits. Basically, it's strong under certain circumstances, but I'm not sure how strong. It's certainly much stronger in white-room, schrodinger's encounter scenarios.

[WanderingMist]

True Strike

The worst.

Funny story about True Strike. The first time I played D&D (which was literally earlier this year), I didn't read the full rules for the spells because I was throwing a character together right before we started (A Gnome Draconic Sorcerer). And then when we actually got to the first encounter, I realized I had zero offensive spells whatsoever, since my other spells and cantrips were: Blade Ward, Minor Illusion, and Message, and Sleep and Detect Magic.


Minor Illusion turned out to be invaluable, as I used it as a sort of pseudo-Invisibility, projecting images of what was behind me in front of myself.

Sleep is also probably overpowered for its level, since it can basically win fights so long as it's cast a round or two in.

And so those are what I would call OP spells. But I'm new, so who knows?

[Luccan]

Funny story about True Strike. The first time I played D&D (which was literally earlier this year), I didn't read the full rules for the spells because I was throwing a character together right before we started (A Gnome Draconic Sorcerer). And then when we actually got to the first encounter, I realized I had zero offensive spells whatsoever, since my other spells and cantrips were: Blade Ward, Minor Illusion, and Message, and Sleep and Detect Magic.


Minor Illusion turned out to be invaluable, as I used it as a sort of pseudo-Invisibility, projecting images of what was behind me in front of myself.

Sleep is also probably overpowered for its level, since it can basically win fights so long as it's cast a round or two in.

And so those are what I would call OP spells. But I'm new, so who knows?

Sleep has some nice advantages in early levels, because it requires no save and lots of enemies only have a handful of hit points, so you can drop half an encounter or more with a single spell.

[MaxWilson]

People that live in California appreciate the Earthquake spell, a bit more than you. 😁
An Earthquake spell can destroy a Daern's Instant Fortress in 2 rounds.

At 50 points of damage per round to buildings, the Earthquake spell essentially is dealing the maximum hit point amount for a 10' cube of stone wall.

The Roman conquest of Albion would have gone quite differently in a world where the inhabitants have access to this spell. Hadrian's Wall becomes Hadrian's Rubble pile.

But in 5E's rules you can just add easily destroy Hadrian's Wall with a volley from the Roman slingers, or thrown javelins. EVERYTHING is weirdly destructible, so who needs Earthquake?

[PhoenixPhyre]

But in 5E's rules you can just add easily destroy Hadrian's Wall with a volley from the Roman slingers, or thrown javelins. EVERYTHING is weirdly destructible, so who needs Earthquake?

No. There's allowance for that--objects only take damage if the DM thinks that that method could work. Cutting a rope with a hammer is mentioned. Plus thresholds, which Hadrian's Wall would have a doozy of.

Edit: More generally, 5e makes the (sane) stipulation that it's the DM's role to inject sanity into the rules. This is not a game where RAW reigns supreme. The text suggests, the DM enacts if and only if it leads to sane outcomes. The DM is allowed, encouraged, empowered, and even commanded to ignore rules when they don't make sense.

[Thunderous Mojo]

Why do you need Jump again?

Exploration, primarily. The Jump spell + a good STR score + lots of rope means the party does not need to resort to Levitation or Fly spells.

Monks and Step of the Wind + Stunning Strike already equals Iron Dome Monk.
Add in a Potion of Jump, and the range of this tactic increases.


But in 5E's rules you can just add easily destroy Hadrian's Wall with a volley from the Roman slingers, or thrown javelins. EVERYTHING is weirdly destructible, so who needs Earthquake?

I never said, one needed Earthquake, but it is very good at what it does;
and what Earthquake does, is something of quite a bit of strategic importance.

A 10' cube of a resilient substance has an average Hit Points total of 27.
If a DM rules that a 10' cube of steel or adamantine has Max Hit Points of 50, then the Earthquake spell is destroying the bottom floor of the structures in it's area effect, regardless of the matierals.

The DMG states this:
If you track hit points for the object, divide it into Large or smaller sections, and track each section's hit points separately. Destroying one of those sections could ruin the entire object. For example, a Gargantuan statue of a human might topple over when one of its Large legs is reduced to 0 hit points.

So in 6 seconds you destroy the bottom 10' which is likely to cause the whole building to collapse. In 12 seconds you have destroyed up to the 20' of the base of the building, which should definitely cause a collapse.
Earthquake + Sharn= very bad news.

Phoenix Pyre already responded, but Damage Threshold prevents squads of slingers from being very effective against stone walls. If time is no option, then yes hordes of zombies can pull down Checkpoint Charlie. Earthquake just does it much, much faster.

[Chaosmancer]

People that live in California appreciate the Earthquake spell, a bit more than you. 😁
An Earthquake spell can destroy a Daern's Instant Fortress in 2 rounds.

At 50 points of damage per round to buildings, the Earthquake spell essentially is dealing the maximum hit point amount for a 10' cube of stone wall.

The Roman conquest of Albion would have gone quite differently in a world where the inhabitants have access to this spell. Hadrian's Wall becomes Hadrian's Rubble pile.

Sure, but how often is "We need to get past this wall" a level 15 adventure point? You can level multiple buildings, potentially burying and destroying everything inside, but how often are you going to want to, let alone have the opportunity?

I'm not going to argue it can't destroy most mundane buildings (which will not be the types of buildings used by higher level threats who are aware of this spell) but that is just not something useful for the party in the majority of situations.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Exploration, primarily. The Jump spell + a good STR score + lots of rope means the party does not need to resort to Levitation or Fly spells.

Monks and Step of the Wind + Stunning Strike already equals Iron Dome Monk.
Add in a Potion of Jump, and the range of this tactic increases.

One thing that people seem to forget is that, per RAW, anyone can climb for half their movement. The DM may call for an athletics check, but if you have a 30 ft stone wall... you can just try and climb it. You have a good strength score anyways

I mean, I guess jump would be useful if you have a sheer steel wall with no way to climb, or a polished stone wall, but a normal wall is climbable fairly easily.

And, if you have enough rope, most 30 ft chasms are fairly easy to get across, which is close to the limit of the Jump spell.

It is just so niche.




I never said, one needed Earthquake, but it is very good at what it does;
and what Earthquake does, is something of quite a bit of strategic importance.

A 10' cube of a resilient substance has an average Hit Points total of 27.
If a DM rules that a 10' cube of steel or adamantine has Max Hit Points of 50, then the Earthquake spell is destroying the bottom floor of the structures in it's area effect, regardless of the matierals.

The DMG states this:
If you track hit points for the object, divide it into Large or smaller sections, and track each section's hit points separately. Destroying one of those sections could ruin the entire object. For example, a Gargantuan statue of a human might topple over when one of its Large legs is reduced to 0 hit points.

So in 6 seconds you destroy the bottom 10' which is likely to cause the whole building to collapse. In 12 seconds you have destroyed up to the 20' of the base of the building, which should definitely cause a collapse.
Earthquake + Sharn= very bad news.

Phoenix Pyre already responded, but Damage Threshold prevents squads of slingers from being very effective against stone walls. If time is no option, then yes hordes of zombies can pull down Checkpoint Charlie. Earthquake just does it much, much faster.


Lets play this out though.

You are a 15th level druid. You cast Earthquake and collapse every tower in Sharn in a 200 ft Diameter circle. That's approximately a city block. Place like Sharn, let's say that is three towers initially.

The collapse will probably damage and destroy nearby towers, with how tall they are lets just call it a scene of devastation that stretches for a thousand feet in every direction. I'll do a rounding error of destroying an entire district of a city like that and say you kill twelve thousand people across all four levels of the city, wrecking untold destruction.


What do you get out of this?

Anything valuable is buried under thousands of literal tons of rubble. The sheer number of innocent bystanders killed would be worse than almost any single military attack in history, but if you had a single target you literally have no way to confirming they are dead. And you devastated one of the most populated cities in the setting, getting a target painted on your back from literally hundreds of thousands of people who will seek your death for the greatest terrorist attack in Eberron's history.


But, lets take this to a forest. You might knock everyone prone and could potentially deal 1d6 fall damage to a few of them.


The entire structure of this spell is basically "Collateral Damage the Spell", all of the power is in reducing buildings full of people to rubble. Which can destroy anything of value you might be after, destroy any evidence you might be seeking, kill any hostages you might want to save. If there is a single valuable thing or innocent person inside, you can't use this spell.

So... what's the point?

[Asisreo1]

So... what's the point?
Earthquake does 5 things at once in a 200ft diameter circle (huge area):

It forces any concentrating creatures to make a constitution saving throw. At this level, this save is a DC 18-19 without any external bonuses. Its nice, especially for spellcasters with weaker consitution.

It forces dex saves for every creature to prevent proning.

It turns the area into difficult terrain.

Fissures appear which can possibly do 1d10*1d6 damage per enemy caught in these fissures on another saving throw. These fissures go from one side to the other, so they are guaranteed to be 200ft long. And there are 1d6 (3-4) fissures that appear. This is a significant chunk of area being dedicated by fissures.

It knocks down structures. This is more than just damage to objects, the debris can also do 5d6 damage to nearby creatures (half the height of the structure), knock them prone, and bury them requiring a DC 20 athletics check.

So, an enemy in the earthquake moves half as fast, must save to prevent being prone, must avoid debris, and must avoid the fissures that appear.

This is quite a precarious situation.

A group of 500 bandits is not even a deadly encounter for the PC's at level 20, yet I imagine a fight with this many bandits would warrant such a large and devastating spell.

This is an extreme example, but its also possible. Especially if these 500 "bandits" are just guards in a castle. Even if there could be slower and more.practical ways to do it, imagine the terror a more grounded setting king would feel when you completely decimate an entire castle singlehandedly in less than a minute.

[ImproperJustice]

I can understand being Snarky, everyone has things that they find particularly irritating.

The odd thing here though is that I have played characters with wall of force (lore bard/2 warlock to level 16 so far, 9th level evoker wizard/1 knowledge cleric) as well as played games where other characters used wall of force and it really hasn't wrecked any of the encounters I've played in. Certainly nothing that would require it to be a 9th level spell.

Wall of force can be a sphere, dome or wall. This usually means it can isolate/control one target or split an opposing group into two sections which might be able to be dealt with separately. This also assumes that there are no enemy spellcasters with disintegrate who could destroy the wall instantly or others with the ability to teleport. The encounter doesn't require every opponent with the ability to teleport - but even a couple will mitigate the effectiveness of the wall in breaking up a group.

There ARE collections of creatures whose attacks are primarily either melee or ranged which will more vulnerable to wall of force tactics that block their attacks and split their groups leaving them with no options but to wait. In addition, a wall of force can be surprisingly effective against dragons (unless you play with the variants where powerful dragons are also spell casters).

So a DM does need to be aware of these constraints when building encounters but overall, in the encounters I have played, Wall of Force has been useful but not a particularly overpowered form of crowd control.

I'm just wondering what experiences you have had that give such a different impression on the power of Wall of Force.

Don't get me wrong, it is a great spell with immense versatility and usefulness in many situations (I've used it as a bridge, to contain a single creature and to split an opposing force in two among other things), it is definitely one of the better spells, but it seems fine to me as a 5th level spell.

Note: On the other hand, my list of "overpowered" spells is also pretty short and usually has to do with cheesy things like abuse of Simulacrum.


P.S. There are also some rules variations that may come into play when using Wall of Force (and may affect the perceived power of the spell) - some folks consider Wall of Force to provide total cover and others do not - which affects casting spells on target you can see on the other side of a wall of force.

You should try playing in a game with Wall of Force where you have an ally caster who drops a damage over time effect prior to your casting of Wall of For e before the enemy has time to react and see if that changes your opinion of the spell.

It doesn’t even have to completely block in the enemy. Large enough opponents may end up restricted enough to still be caught in say a Wall of Fire or Sickening Radiance burst and unable to get out of the AOE with no hope of overcoming the wall and no save to avoid the entrapment.

[Thunderous Mojo]

It is just so niche.

Spells that are "niche" and spells that underperform in their effects, are two distinctly different categories. Certain individual spells might be both niche and underpowered, but a niche spell is not by definition always underpowered.

Chaosmancer, your position implies all "niche" spells are under-powered.

True Strike is underpowered due to the spell not being very efficient in granting Advantage for an attack roll.

The Illusory Script spell, in contrast is not under-powered, even though the spell is most certainly a "niche" spell. Illusory Script accomplishes what the spell sets out to do, quite well. Of course what Illusory Script does, may never come up in your game.

Jump is niche, but it does deliver on what the spell promises..namely, jumping.


So... what's the point?
Some D&D games deal mainly with tactical concerns. Your objections to Eathquake, seemingly center around the tactical concerns such as that the spell destroys the dungeon, and thus the opportunity to loot., or inflicts excessive collateral damage.

I don't disagree with you. Earthquake's value is Strategic, not tactical.
If your game does not deal with strategic concerns,( and most probably do not), then a cleric or druid is not likely to be preparing the spell.

Once a cleric or druid can access Earthquake, that character alone has reached a level of power comparable to a non-magical Medieval State.

"What happened to the city of Jericho"
"The city angered the priest David, and they had the earth swallow the town"

YMMV, if such strategic/world narrative power is important.
Earthquake is not under-powered, regardless, though it may be niche.

[SpanielBear]

<Cut for brevity>

Lets play this out though.

You are a 15th level druid. You cast Earthquake and collapse every tower in Sharn in a 200 ft Diameter circle. That's approximately a city block. Place like Sharn, let's say that is three towers initially.

The collapse will probably damage and destroy nearby towers, with how tall they are lets just call it a scene of devastation that stretches for a thousand feet in every direction. I'll do a rounding error of destroying an entire district of a city like that and say you kill twelve thousand people across all four levels of the city, wrecking untold destruction.


What do you get out of this?

Anything valuable is buried under thousands of literal tons of rubble. The sheer number of innocent bystanders killed would be worse than almost any single military attack in history, but if you had a single target you literally have no way to confirming they are dead. And you devastated one of the most populated cities in the setting, getting a target painted on your back from literally hundreds of thousands of people who will seek your death for the greatest terrorist attack in Eberron's history.


But, lets take this to a forest. You might knock everyone prone and could potentially deal 1d6 fall damage to a few of them.


The entire structure of this spell is basically "Collateral Damage the Spell", all of the power is in reducing buildings full of people to rubble. Which can destroy anything of value you might be after, destroy any evidence you might be seeking, kill any hostages you might want to save. If there is a single valuable thing or innocent person inside, you can't use this spell.

So... what's the point?

Just to address the earthquake issue a little, there’s a class of spells that seem to be designed not so much for players as npcs. Contagion has already been mentioned, but things like Bestow Curse and Earthquake probably belong on there too. Because while it may not be the kind of spell a party would want to use in a built up area, it is definitely a spell a (good) party would want to *prevent* being used in a built up area. So the spell then becomes useful not in the players arsenal, but the GM’s.

[MaxWilson]

Phoenix Pyre already responded, but Damage Threshold prevents squads of slingers from being very effective against stone walls.

And yet quantity has a quality of its own. If a battalion of slingers/javelineers can annihilate stone monsters like Galeb Duhr in a fraction of a round, what's to stop them from annihilating stone walls too? Especially with Wall of Stone as a precedent. 300 Dex 12 slingers (+3 to hit, d4+1 damage) vs. 1 Wall of Stone inflict 510 DPR, which means chewing through 17 inches of Wall of Stone rock per round.

Now you can certainly rule that Wall of Stone produces unusually soft and destructible rock, even after it becomes permanent and nonmagical, and you can even give walls a damage resistance so high that it's hard for even mauls and sledgehammers to damage them even on a crit--but one way or another you have to grapple with the fact that objects in D&D are do not have the same relative immunity to damage that they do in real life. Look at PHB manacles--a moderately strong person (Str 12) restrained by manacles can head-butt their way out of their manacles in a matter of minutes! It only takes seven hits (15 HP) and the manacles have no damage resistance. Destructibility for everything is the 5E way. Hadrian's Wall in 5E would not last long against an army.

[Bilbron]

And yet quantity has a quality of its own. If a battalion of slingers/javelineers can annihilate stone monsters like Galeb Duhr in a fraction of a round, what's to stop them from annihilating stone walls too? Especially with Wall of Stone as a precedent. 300 Dex 12 slingers (+3 to hit, d4+1 damage) vs. 1 Wall of Stone inflict 510 DPR, which means chewing through 17 inches of Wall of Stone rock per round.

Now you can certainly rule that Wall of Stone produces unusually soft and destructible rock, even after it becomes permanent and nonmagical, and you can even give walls a damage resistance so high that it's hard for even mauls and sledgehammers to damage them even on a crit--but one way or another you have to grapple with the fact that objects in D&D are do not have the same relative immunity to damage that they do in real life. Look at PHB manacles--a moderately strong person (Str 12) restrained by manacles can head-butt their way out of their manacles in a matter of minutes! It only takes seven hits (15 HP) and the manacles have no damage resistance. Destructibility for everything is the 5E way. Hadrian's Wall in 5E would not last long against an army.

I personally think Wall of Stone is soft rock as it lacks a Damage Treshhold.

I also think the object rules in 5e are super bad in that almost nothing has a DT, and the AC/HP are just terrible. IMO hard objects like Stone or Metal should always have a DT no matter how small they are, otherwise you end up where a kid with a slingshot can knock down a castle wall in a matter of minutes.

[kazaryu]

While it's true that many people don't think about this, try to make a list of High Level spells that require attack rolls. It would need to deal more damage than 4d10 at level 5, 6d10 at level 11, and 8d10 at level 17. In order to outdo casting two fire bolts.

i mean...it doesn't hve to deal damage...

and the reason i bring that up is because of plane shift. which is...probably the highest level spell attack. i can't think of any that are higher....regardless, there's a decent chance it'd be worth it to cast for that. not really a reason to take the spell though. but if, for some reason, you had the spell then...there ya go. lol

[Galithar]

i mean...it doesn't hve to deal damage...

and the reason i bring that up is because of plane shift. which is...probably the highest level spell attack. i can't think of any that are higher....regardless, there's a decent chance it'd be worth it to cast for that. not really a reason to take the spell though. but if, for some reason, you had the spell then...there ya go. lol

Hey, that one is better than Chromatic Orb. Still Plane Shift has a saving throw AFTER the attack hits. Which means that, while valuable if it works, I still don't think that using an action to setup True Strike just for an increased chance at making someone roll a save with Plane Shift is very viable in comparison to simply casting different spells.

I did forget about attack roll options that aren't damaged based, but honestly I'd rather use Banishment over Plane Shift anyways. Very close to the same effect in a lot of circumstances (though not all since Banishment allows many of them to reappear eventually).

I am interested in a list of all spells (specifically non damaging ones) that require attack rolls though if you or anyone else has one.

[MaxWilson]

i mean...it doesn't hve to deal damage...

and the reason i bring that up is because of plane shift. which is...probably the highest level spell attack. i can't think of any that are higher....regardless, there's a decent chance it'd be worth it to cast for that. not really a reason to take the spell though. but if, for some reason, you had the spell then...there ya go. lol

Plane Shift would be a decent argument if not for the fact that getting Help (from a familiar, Tiny Servant, whatever) is still cheaper than spending concentration and an extra round setting up Plane Shift.

No matter how hard I try to make True Strike worthwhile, the only time it's even decent is for canceling out disadvantage, e.g. a wizard without spell slots who is fighting a high-AC invisible foe is better off alternating between True Strike and Booming Blade than sticking purely to Booming Blade. But honestly, if you're in that situation you're toast already, and who wants to learn a cantrip that's useful only when you're already toast?


I did forget about attack roll options that aren't damaged based, but honestly I'd rather use Banishment over Plane Shift anyways. Very close to the same effect in a lot of circumstances (though not all since Banishment allows many of them to reappear eventually).

In some cases you might be playing a Druid, who doesn't have access to Banishment, or you might be a Cleric who's busy concentrating on Spirit Guardians V or Holy Aura or a different Banishment, and in that case Plane Shift is still available because it's non-concentration. But in that case you want to get your advantage via Help, not True Strike.

Side note: if you're a Mobile Moon Druid, the attack roll on Plane Shift actually makes it slightly easier to kite as a nice fringe benefit, although that only matters if the Plane Shift fails.

[kazaryu]

Hey, that one is better than Chromatic Orb. Still Plane Shift has a saving throw AFTER the attack hits. Which means that, while valuable if it works, I still don't think that using an action to setup True Strike just for an increased chance at making someone roll a save with Plane Shift is very viable in comparison to simply casting different spells.

I did forget about attack roll options that aren't damaged based, but honestly I'd rather use Banishment over Plane Shift anyways. Very close to the same effect in a lot of circumstances (though not all since Banishment allows many of them to reappear eventually).

I am interested in a list of all spells (specifically non damaging ones) that require attack rolls though if you or anyone else has one.

well, for plane shift, i mean yeah, it requires a saving throw. *but* at least the ST is wis, which isn't a super common one. also, since its already niche AF a use, may as well just call it a diviner lol. then its just about the attack hitting. problem with banishment is that it takes concentration, and can therefore be dispelled. but like i said, plane shift is not a good enough reason to justify taking true strike.

other spells that use attack rolls..bigbys hand, minute meteors (good time to point out that im not trying to say that these are good uses of true strike, they just use attack rolls), acid arrow, uhhhh....thats off the top of my head.

side note: another thing that has been pointed out before is that sorcerers can open up a few more options with true strike, since they can bypass one of its biggest limiters (i.e the fact that it eats your action). even then it becomes more of a novelty build, not really a 'good' build. but i could see a sorcerer taking it for certain very specific reasons.

[TIPOT]

Or you can use a rope and pull him out. If the character who fell into the pit has Jump spell, great. But if he does not, you can't cast it on him anyway, because Jump is a touch spell. If 2 or more people fell into the pit, Jump can only get 1 of them out.

Why do you need Jump again?

In combats with difficult terrain jump can be surprisingly good. A 20 str character with it can do a 30ft standing long jump letting them ignore most of it.

[Asisreo1]

Plane Shift would be a decent argument if not for the fact that getting Help (from a familiar, Tiny Servant, whatever) is still cheaper than spending concentration and an extra round setting up Plane Shift.

Sometimes its just unviable to get a help action going. If the enemy has a mean melee potential, alot of players aren't going to feel comfortable completely giving up their action and being completely vulnerable for this set up. Not to mention, sorcerers don't have find familiar and not all wizards, bards, and warlocks have theirs. Especially if they recently died. So while there are some ways to gain advantage, those situations become niche onto themselves.

Arcane Trickster is an obvious reason for True Strike and my suspected reason for it being somewhat weaker. If any concept would use True Strike, its definitely the rogue. It isn't always viable for your melee characters to approach in every situation. If they get ganged up on, it could be suicide. When such a situation arises, a rogue may often find value in True Strike, an insurance that they at least get Sneak Attack half of the time.

Versatile Trickster and the ability to Hide well and quickly are reasons why this is mitigated, but the former doesn't arrive until level 13 and the latter is DM-dependent and isn't always viable.

I think True Strike has a use in a sort of "backup" plan sort of niche. When the rogue just can't lock down a reliable sneak attack.

[Galithar]

Sometimes its just unviable to get a help action going. If the enemy has a mean melee potential, alot of players aren't going to feel comfortable completely giving up their action and being completely vulnerable for this set up. Not to mention, sorcerers don't have find familiar and not all wizards, bards, and warlocks have theirs. Especially if they recently died. So while there are some ways to gain advantage, those situations become niche onto themselves.

Arcane Trickster is an obvious reason for True Strike and my suspected reason for it being somewhat weaker. If any concept would use True Strike, its definitely the rogue. It isn't always viable for your melee characters to approach in every situation. If they get ganged up on, it could be suicide. When such a situation arises, a rogue may often find value in True Strike, an insurance that they at least get Sneak Attack half of the time.

Versatile Trickster and the ability to Hide well and quickly are reasons why this is mitigated, but the former doesn't arrive until level 13 and the latter is DM-dependent and isn't always viable.

I think True Strike has a use in a sort of "backup" plan sort of niche. When the rogue just can't lock down a reliable sneak attack.

That niche is almost totally removed if you play with Tasha's variants (which I believe or AL legal and I expect many, but surely not all, tables will allow going forward). The Steady Aim feat allows the rogue to give themselves advantage as a bonus action, at the cost of locking out their movement. True Strike would only add anything if you need advantage AND your bonus action and/or movement are more valuable to you than your action and concentration.

[Thunderous Mojo]

And yet quantity has a quality of its own. If a battalion of slingers/javelineers can annihilate stone monsters like Galeb Duhr in a fraction of a round, what's to stop them from annihilating stone walls too?

The Damage Threshold rules stops the massed fire of the slingers.
Damage Threshold. Big objects such as castle walls often have extra resilience represented by a damage threshold. An object with a damage threshold has immunity to all damage unless it takes an amount of damage from a single attack or effect equal to or greater than its damage threshold, in which case it takes damage as normal. Any damage that fails to meet or exceed the object's damage threshold is considered superficial and doesn't reduce the object's hit points.

The Damage Threshold applies to each individual attack not to just the damage total from massed fire. Should a Galeb Duhr be immune to non-magical BPS, perhaps..but items have Damage Threshold rules so each table can adjust their actions to met the verisimilitude they desire.

[MaxWilson]

The Damage Threshold rules stops the massed fire of the slingers.
Damage Threshold. Big objects such as castle walls often have extra resilience represented by a damage threshold. An object with a damage threshold has immunity to all damage unless it takes an amount of damage from a single attack or effect equal to or greater than its damage threshold, in which case it takes damage as normal. Any damage that fails to meet or exceed the object's damage threshold is considered superficial and doesn't reduce the object's hit points.

The Damage Threshold applies to each individual attack not to just the damage total from massed fire. Should a Galeb Duhr be immune to non-magical BPS, perhaps..but items have Damage Threshold rules so each table can adjust their actions to met the verisimilitude they desire.

I am well aware of how DMG pg. 246 damage thresholds work, have used them before myself, but you're neglecting to quote anything proving that the threshold is high enough to require an Earthquake instead of sledgehammers/javelins/etc. because there is no such rule. It's just DM fiat, as I said before.

5E makes pretty much everything weirdly destructible. Again, a moderately-strong (Str 12) person can head-butt PHB manacles into uselessness in a matter of minutes or seconds, and PHB do NOT have damage threshold.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I am well aware of how DMG pg. 246 damage thresholds work, have used them before myself, but you're neglecting to quote anything proving that the threshold is high enough to require an Earthquake instead of sledgehammers/javelins/etc. because there is no such rule. It's just DM fiat, as I said before.

5E makes pretty much everything weirdly destructible. Again, a moderately-strong (Str 12) person can head-butt PHB manacles into uselessness in a matter of minutes or seconds, and PHB do NOT have damage threshold.

Damage thresholds are assigned by the DM (not by the books for 90% of items), and the DM is encouraged to say that certain methods cannot damage certain objects.

Yes, if you laser focus on the text only, it's weird. But that's because you're leaving off the part of the game that the DM is expected to inject based on the type of game they want to run.

[Chaosmancer]

Earthquake does 5 things at once in a 200ft diameter circle (huge area):

It forces any concentrating creatures to make a constitution saving throw. At this level, this save is a DC 18-19 without any external bonuses. Its nice, especially for spellcasters with weaker consitution.

Hmm, I had missed this. I thought it was just a concentration save. Okay, so it is good for breaking concentration... including your concentration if you are in the area of effect. But, if you need to break the concentration of someone 100 ft away, this is a decent way to do that. There are better ways, but this is decent


It forces dex saves for every creature to prevent proning.

It turns the area into difficult terrain.

Sure, for you and your allies as well though. And if you aren't in the area, then being knocked prone or having difficult terrain doesn't really,,, affect anything? I mean, I guess it can be a huge area of slowing them down, but what fight at 15th level starts more than 100 ft away, with enemies that need to run towards you, and that you would prefer to keep at a distance, and are willing to burn an 8th level slot on?


Fissures appear which can possibly do 1d10*1d6 damage per enemy caught in these fissures on another saving throw. These fissures go from one side to the other, so they are guaranteed to be 200ft long. And there are 1d6 (3-4) fissures that appear. This is a significant chunk of area being dedicated by fissures.

See, this is where the randomness really gets me. You could have 1 fissure that deals 1d6 damage to no one (because the DM places them) or six fissures that might deal 10d6 damage... if the enemy fails the dex save. So... at best, this spell might deal 35 damage to a few enemies.

And they are only 10 ft wide, so anything with a Strength 14 or 15 can trivially jump them and avoid them once they have formed.


It knocks down structures. This is more than just damage to objects, the debris can also do 5d6 damage to nearby creatures (half the height of the structure), knock them prone, and bury them requiring a DC 20 athletics check.

Sure, if you cast it in an area where there are structures, meaning you are devastating some area, and if there is anything of value in those structures, they are also buried or destroyed.

And the structure only damages and buries them if it falls toward the enemy. What if it falls towards you and your allies? Or in a direction that doesn't hit anyone?



So, an enemy in the earthquake moves half as fast, must save to prevent being prone, must avoid debris, and must avoid the fissures that appear.

This is quite a precarious situation.

A group of 500 bandits is not even a deadly encounter for the PC's at level 20, yet I imagine a fight with this many bandits would warrant such a large and devastating spell.

This is an extreme example, but its also possible. Especially if these 500 "bandits" are just guards in a castle. Even if there could be slower and more.practical ways to do it, imagine the terror a more grounded setting king would feel when you completely decimate an entire castle singlehandedly in less than a minute.


Again, yeah, it is precarious, but was it worth your most powerful spell to accomplish... wide area difficult terrain and losing concentration spells on people 100 ft away?

Because that is the minimum the spell does. A huge section of difficult terrain where spellcasters can't concentrate. All the rest relies on the DM to give you an ideal set up and have things randomly fall in a beneficial manner.


And yeah, sure, you could kill a king, his entire family, his entire staff, all of his guards, all the peasants, all the hunting dogs, all the horses, and anything else inside the castle.

But how many of them did you actually want to kill? Did you want to kill the scullery maid? What about the Stable Boy? The Princess? Any prisoners in the Dungeon?

That is the worst part of this spell, it is complete devastation of areas full of civilians. Yes, everyone is pants-****tingly terrified of you now, because you are a mass-murderer who can destroy any place and kill hundreds or thousands of people at a whim... but is that really what you want? What does that accomplish for your normal heroic party?

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Spells that are "niche" and spells that underperform in their effects, are two distinctly different categories. Certain individual spells might be both niche and underpowered, but a niche spell is not by definition always underpowered.

snipped

Jump is niche, but it does deliver on what the spell promises..namely, jumping.

Sure, Jump lets you jump good. But, when does that actually help? That's the point of me saying Niche.

I'll give you, if you are trapped in a pit, with smooth sides that you can't climb, and your party is too busy to drop you a rope, then casting Jump to jump out of the pit is useful.

How often does that happen? And more importantly, how often does that happen before you are level 3 and take Spider Climb? Spider Climb's exploration uses are also Niche, but there are clever ways to use it. Avoiding trapped floors by traveling on the ceiling, using it in combat to avoid melee enemies, there are quite a few applications. Jump only lets you jump farther, and its only uses seem to be avoiding just using ropes.




Some D&D games deal mainly with tactical concerns. Your objections to Eathquake, seemingly center around the tactical concerns such as that the spell destroys the dungeon, and thus the opportunity to loot., or inflicts excessive collateral damage.

I don't disagree with you. Earthquake's value is Strategic, not tactical.
If your game does not deal with strategic concerns,( and most probably do not), then a cleric or druid is not likely to be preparing the spell.

Once a cleric or druid can access Earthquake, that character alone has reached a level of power comparable to a non-magical Medieval State.

"What happened to the city of Jericho"
"The city angered the priest David, and they had the earth swallow the town"

YMMV, if such strategic/world narrative power is important.
Earthquake is not under-powered, regardless, though it may be niche.


Your mileage may vary is right, because I'm not sure how often I want my hero of the realm to say "Do what I say, or I swear I will kill every man, woman, child and animal in this town."

I mean, take a look up at the castle idea posited. Sure, my Druid can use Earthquake to destroy the entire castle, killing everyone inside except for the most powerful and dangerous people. You know, the people I likely would have most wanted to actually kill in the attack?

I don't tend to want to play mass murderers of innocent civilians, and that is what this spell is designed to be most effective at.

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Just to address the earthquake issue a little, there’s a class of spells that seem to be designed not so much for players as npcs. Contagion has already been mentioned, but things like Bestow Curse and Earthquake probably belong on there too. Because while it may not be the kind of spell a party would want to use in a built up area, it is definitely a spell a (good) party would want to *prevent* being used in a built up area. So the spell then becomes useful not in the players arsenal, but the GM’s.


100% agreed, but I don't think those make very good spells for the game.

I mean, if I wanted to have an evil druid capable of doing this that I would want the PCs to stop.. I'd make it a ritual not a single action spell. You literally can't stop this spell from being cast by an enemy . They get within 500 ft and in six seconds it has begun.

It exists for story purposes, but I can make any story spell I need to make as the DM.

[Witty Username]

I am well aware of how DMG pg. 246 damage thresholds work, have used them before myself, but you're neglecting to quote anything proving that the threshold is high enough to require an Earthquake instead of sledgehammers/javelins/etc. because there is no such rule. It's just DM fiat, as I said before.

5E makes pretty much everything weirdly destructible. Again, a moderately-strong (Str 12) person can head-butt PHB manacles into uselessness in a matter of minutes or seconds, and PHB do NOT have damage threshold.

So your arguing that since there are no stated damage thresholds, damage thresholds do not exist? Or that damage thresholds cannot be logically high enough to require earthquake?

Why is the PHB not having damage threshold rules matter? By the PHB there are no rules for attacking objects, so it would be about as likely to assume that stone walls cannot be attacked unless stated otherwise. Flub, but still the rules for HP and AC are DM's discretion, so whether attacks can destroy objects is not necessarily reasonable. And not really needed for the Player side of the table.

[MaxWilson]

So your arguing that since there are no stated damage thresholds, damage thresholds do not exist? Or that damage thresholds cannot be logically high enough to require earthquake?

Nope. Arguing that damage thresholds are an afterthought not well-integrated into 5E's mechanics, unlikely to come into play in any given scenario, and Earthquake's ability to damage structures is likewise unlikely to have military significance at many tables.

[SharkForce]

sleet storm does most of the good stuff that earthquake does, unless you're looking to collapse a building (it forces concentration saves, knocks people prone in a large AoE, creates difficult terrain, and actually also blocks LOS which arguably makes it even better at keeping annoying spellcasters or creatures with other magical abilities from bothering you. also, it should work on flying creatures). the range and AoE aren't as high, but they're usually good enough, and it's a level 3 spell which is a pretty substantial improvement. that said, earthquake is at least good at destroying buildings. you may not particularly care to destroy buildings, but at least it does what it is supposed to, while other spells don't (like find traps, which doesn't find traps at all, it just lets you know when you're near one. where is it? who knows, you'd need a spell that *finds* traps for that information). it isn't a high bar to jump, but at least earthquake can jump that bar without falling flat on its face.

jump, I actually think is decent in the right terrain. it isn't a self-only spell. you can put it on an ally and they have one minute of concentration-free enhanced jumping. on the right character, it is enough to jump on top of one-story buildings, jump from one building to another, jump over pits and traps, jump over difficult terrain, etc. it isn't amazing, but as a combat mobility spell it can still be quite good. it doesn't require object interactions or climbing (so it doubles your speed), you can increase your jumping distance cap by dashing (you can't jump further than you can move, but with a dash you can move twice as far)... I do think the duration could use a bit of an increase (10 minutes would allow for more exploration use... and yes, moving around at double speed and without needing your hands and without costing concentration does make it quite handy), but it actually is a respectable mobility buff.

and true strike... just... no. there is no good use for it as written. trust me. if you think you've found a good use, you've probably missed something. for example, quickened true strike sounds good at first... but true strike improves an attack on the next round. not this one. so you need an enemy who is within 30 feet, who you can afford to wait a turn to attack (note: if you're hidden so they're unaware of you then you wouldn't need true strike to hit them), who isn't going to move away or become a less valuable target or be killed in the intervening round, and who you wouldn't rather be concentrating on something else instead for any reason. I mean, I could imagine a scenario where true strike might be useful (maybe), but it is going to sound incredibly contrived.

[Thunderous Mojo]

I am well aware of how DMG pg. 246 damage thresholds work, have used them before myself, but you're neglecting to quote anything proving that the threshold is high enough to require an Earthquake instead of sledgehammers/javelins/etc. because there is no such rule. It's just DM fiat, as I said before.

5E makes pretty much everything weirdly destructible. Again, a moderately-strong (Str 12) person can head-butt PHB manacles into uselessness in a matter of minutes or seconds, and PHB do NOT have damage threshold.

I'm going to quote the DMG again. You know the rules Max, so please, never assume if I quote a section of rules text that I am implying you or anyone else are unaware of the rules.
When characters need to saw through ropes, shatter a window, or smash a vampire's coffin, the only hard and fast rule is this: given enough time and the right tools, characters can destroy any destructible object. Use common sense when determining a character's success at damaging an object. Can a fighter cut through a section of a stone wall with a sword? No, the sword is likely to break before the wall does.

So a DM is well within their rights to state that head-butting one's way out of manacles is simply impossible.

If a DM does decide that one's forehead is a perfectly sound method to destroy metal manacles, then the DM is free to calibrate the Damage Threshold to their particular campaign. Empowering DMs in this manner is fine.

A stone wall in my rolled stats, High powered game might need to have a higher Damage Threshold than a game that uses a lower power baseline for the PCs.

Clearly spelling out the principles for destroying objects, (as I would contend the DMG does succinctly), and leaving DM's to calibrate the actual Damage Thresholds to fit their particular game, is not a poor choice on the part of the designers.

Chapter 8 of the DMG should be Chapter 1, in my view, though. The book buries the lead, as it were.


I'll give you, if you are trapped in a pit, with smooth sides that you can't climb, and your party is too busy to drop you a rope, then casting Jump to jump out of the pit is useful.

How often does that happen

Again, this is campaign dependent. The answer for some will be:
"It happens a lot".

Inside a Beholder lair, in a Mind Flayer colony, in the fortress of creatures with easy access to teleport like Fiends, or the Gith Battlecruiser that phased into a mountain...all might contain numerous smooth vertical passageways.

A heart defibrillator is a piece of niche equipment. Just because something fills a niche that you don't need filled, doesn't mean that niche is not useful to others.

As to Earthquake..it is a war spell. When in war, one might feel compelled to blow up the Death Star, despite the fact the Empire has non-combatant contractors aboard.

The size of a Meteor Swarm spell is so large, concerns regarding collateral damage often make that spell unethical as well.

Nope. Arguing that damage thresholds are an afterthought not well-integrated into 5E's mechanics, unlikely to come into play in any given scenario, and Earthquake's ability to damage structures is likewise unlikely to have military significance at many tables.

I believe I have been very explicit regarding the limited applications of the Earthquake spell. I also believe I have been explicit about explicating the perspective, I'm using, and have made no claims to universality.

D&D tables can run the gamut from Earthquakes leveling buildings in 6 to 12 seconds, to Earthquakes not destroying buildings due to DM fiat, (but you can head-butt your way through steel 😀), to gaming perspectives one has never dreamt of.

I like reading D&D perspectives, I don't share. It broadens my perspective, even if I will never incorporate the perspective into play.

[Chaosmancer]

Again, this is campaign dependent. The answer for some will be:
"It happens a lot".

Inside a Beholder lair, in a Mind Flayer colony, in the fortress of creatures with easy access to teleport like Fiends, or the Gith Battlecruiser that phased into a mountain...all might contain numerous smooth vertical passageways.

A heart defibrillator is a piece of niche equipment. Just because something fills a niche that you don't need filled, doesn't mean that niche is not useful to others.

The problem though is Spider Climb.

Because you aren't going to be going inside Beholder Lairs, Mind Flayer Colonies, Fiend Fortresses or Gith Battlecruisers at level 1. You might not get to them before level 10.

So, the fact that Jump is a 1st level spell actually works against it because a 2nd level spell is of similar value, and Spider Climb is also going to provide the same or better access in those scenarios. After all, your maximum jump height even with Jump is... about 27 feet (3+mod of 5 is 8, multiplied by 3 is 24, add 1/2 of six foot height)? Impressive, but a 30 ft tube is completely unclearable, and you might take 2d6 fall damage from the attempt.

But if you can touch a wall, Spider Climb can allow you to clamber up an... yeah it lasts an hour, that is an arbitrarily huge area. 60 ft per round (dashing), 600 rounds.

So, in all of your examples... Spider Climb is still the more useful spell, and it is useful in more situations, and it is just as "cheap" for those high level adventures.





As to Earthquake..it is a war spell. When in war, one might feel compelled to blow up the Death Star, despite the fact the Empire has non-combatant contractors aboard.

The size of a Meteor Swarm spell is so large, concerns regarding collateral damage often make that spell unethical as well.

The problem with that comparison is that Meteor Swarm can be as small as an 80 ft diameter (you can stack the meteors even if it has no effect), and does 40d6 even in the flattest of flat plains with no cover.

And actually, if you want to talk about destroying walls. Earthquake can level a 200 ft section of wall, but Meteor Swarm can level a 320 ft section of wall. And 40d6 is an average of 140 damage, which is enough to break most thresholds.


So it is useful when there aren't civilians around and can destroy buildings. But it is a 9th level spell after all.




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Oh Right!

Another nearly useless spell. Move Earth. Incredibly limited spell, especially for being 6th level.

[noob]

The problem though is Spider Climb.

Because you aren't going to be going inside Beholder Lairs, Mind Flayer Colonies, Fiend Fortresses or Gith Battlecruisers at level 1. You might not get to them before level 10.

So, the fact that Jump is a 1st level spell actually works against it because a 2nd level spell is of similar value, and Spider Climb is also going to provide the same or better access in those scenarios. After all, your maximum jump height even with Jump is... about 27 feet (3+mod of 5 is 8, multiplied by 3 is 24, add 1/2 of six foot height)? Impressive, but a 30 ft tube is completely unclearable, and you might take 2d6 fall damage from the attempt.

But if you can touch a wall, Spider Climb can allow you to clamber up an... yeah it lasts an hour, that is an arbitrarily huge area. 60 ft per round (dashing), 600 rounds.

So, in all of your examples... Spider Climb is still the more useful spell, and it is useful in more situations, and it is just as "cheap" for those high level adventures.






The problem with that comparison is that Meteor Swarm can be as small as an 80 ft diameter (you can stack the meteors even if it has no effect), and does 40d6 even in the flattest of flat plains with no cover.

And actually, if you want to talk about destroying walls. Earthquake can level a 200 ft section of wall, but Meteor Swarm can level a 320 ft section of wall. And 40d6 is an average of 140 damage, which is enough to break most thresholds.


So it is useful when there aren't civilians around and can destroy buildings. But it is a 9th level spell after all.




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Oh Right!

Another nearly useless spell. Move Earth. Incredibly limited spell, especially for being 6th level.

I believe the point of move earth is to help to do foundations for houses and stuff like that: cast it a dozen of times and you can make a non flat place much better for building houses.
I do not think it was meant to be used as an adventuring tool but rather as an easy to sell spellcasting service that can occasionally be used for other things like when you decide you do like to flatten things like a minecraft player.

[Jerrykhor]

jump, I actually think is decent in the right terrain. it isn't a self-only spell. you can put it on an ally and they have one minute of concentration-free enhanced jumping. on the right character, it is enough to jump on top of one-story buildings, jump from one building to another, jump over pits and traps, jump over difficult terrain, etc. it isn't amazing, but as a combat mobility spell it can still be quite good. it doesn't require object interactions or climbing (so it doubles your speed), you can increase your jumping distance cap by dashing (you can't jump further than you can move, but with a dash you can move twice as far)... I do think the duration could use a bit of an increase (10 minutes would allow for more exploration use... and yes, moving around at double speed and without needing your hands and without costing concentration does make it quite handy), but it actually is a respectable mobility buff.

The problem with Jump is, its not so unique that there are problems that only Jump can solve. Its unique in that it does this stupid thing that nobody really needs. I have played for many years, at no time i was like, yeah having Jump would be really useful right now.

Someone mention Jump is good in urgent situations. If you really need to get to point B and use your action, then Misty Step is better. It gives you extra distance to cover, you can bypass obstacles, and you still have your Action. You can also Misty Step vertical distances, which is like jumping. You might say oh but its a level 2 spell. Yeah it is, and it gets the job done. If its urgent, i dont care what level of spell it is, I would Dimension Door if i have to.

A lot of the examples you mention only solve the problem for one guy, not the whole team. If you are gonna say 'Exploration' like the previous guy, remember that it only last 1 minute. Once the guy has done exploring, how is he going to get back through all the things that he could only cross with Jump? There are better alternatives for exploring that don't require using a level 1 spell slot, such as Find Familiar.

[Gignere]

The biggest problem with jump is that it’s not a cantrip.

[Asisreo1]

The problem with Jump is, its not so unique that there are problems that only Jump can solve. Its unique in that it does this stupid thing that nobody really needs. I have played for many years, at no time i was like, yeah having Jump would be really useful right now.

Someone mention Jump is good in urgent situations. If you really need to get to point B and use your action, then Misty Step is better. It gives you extra distance to cover, you can bypass obstacles, and you still have your Action. You can also Misty Step vertical distances, which is like jumping. You might say oh but its a level 2 spell. Yeah it is, and it gets the job done. If its urgent, i dont care what level of spell it is, I would Dimension Door if i have to.

A lot of the examples you mention only solve the problem for one guy, not the whole team. If you are gonna say 'Exploration' like the previous guy, remember that it only last 1 minute. Once the guy has done exploring, how is going to get back through all the things that he could only cross with Jump? There are better alternatives for exploring that don't require using a level 1 spell slot, such as Find Familiar.
Imagine a 5th-level wizard. He has his core combat spells prepared and has the room for 3 more spells so he takes Jump, Misty Step, and Fly.

He's in a situation where a vertical wall approximately 30ft high blocks their progression. He sees his 3 spells and knows to cast one of them. If he casts fly, he spent half of his most powerful resources just to see whats at the top of a wall. If he casts Misty Step, that's a third of his second level spells which is still a fairly steep price. If he casts Jump, its a fourth of his first level slots.

Obviously, in this situation, its cheaper to have cast Jump. Jump might not seem to be an essential spell but it can save early game spellcasters alot of expensive options, especially wizards and Druids since they can easily afford to take them even at level 1.

Another important aspect is that not all characters have access to spells and spell slots like a wizard does. The Druid and Ranger have neither Misty Step, Spider Climb, or Fly. If a Druid wants to move in that vertical surface, they must use one of their 2 Wild Shapes. Of which, they only have 2 per short rest. In fact, a druid's Wild Shape is more valuable as a Moon Druid since they're class features rely solely on it and its their only boon over any other type of Druid.

Warlocks have few leveled spell slots. Unless they're sure they can get a short rest before a fight, its extremely risky to even cast Fly for anything unrelated to combat. The Jump invocation can be quite useful for a low level warlock to get around without affecting lowering their combat potential.

[Gignere]

Imagine a 5th-level wizard. He has his core combat spells prepared and has the room for 3 more spells so he takes Jump, Misty Step, and Fly.

He's in a situation where a vertical wall approximately 30ft high blocks their progression. He sees his 3 spells and knows to cast one of them. If he casts fly, he spent half of his most powerful resources just to see whats at the top of a wall. If he casts Misty Step, that's a third of his second level spells which is still a fairly steep price. If he casts Jump, its a fourth of his first level slots.

Obviously, in this situation, its cheaper to have cast Jump. Jump might not seem to be an essential spell but it can save early game spellcasters alot of expensive options, especially wizards and Druids since they can easily afford to take them even at level 1.

Another important aspect is that not all characters have access to spells and spell slots like a wizard does. The Druid and Ranger have neither Misty Step, Spider Climb, or Fly. If a Druid wants to move in that vertical surface, they must use one of their 2 Wild Shapes. Of which, they only have 2 per short rest. In fact, a druid's Wild Shape is more valuable as a Moon Druid since they're class features rely solely on it and its their only boon over any other type of Druid.

Warlocks have few leveled spell slots. Unless they're sure they can get a short rest before a fight, its extremely risky to even cast Fly for anything unrelated to combat. The Jump invocation can be quite useful for a low level warlock to get around without affecting lowering their combat potential.

I would just have my familiar fly a rope up the 30 feet and save myself a spell slot.

Jump invocation requires level 9 in lock I think.

[Asisreo1]

I would just have my familiar fly a rope up the 30 feet and save myself a spell slot.

Druids and Rangers don't have Find Familiar. A wizard may also not have his familiar on him, too. We can't forget that familiars are fragile and can die. There's also no guarantee the familiar you have on-hand can fly. Not saying its impossible or even unlikely, but there being a wizard with a specific spell shouldn't be the assumption. Especially when the spell requires costly material components.


Jump invocation requires level 9 in lock I think.
The principle still applies. Perhaps moreso since invocations are more abundant yet spell slots are still relatively scarce.

[Jerrykhor]

Druids and Rangers don't have Find Familiar. A wizard may also not have his familiar on him, too. We can't forget that familiars are fragile and can die. There's also no guarantee the familiar you have on-hand can fly. Not saying its impossible or even unlikely, but there being a wizard with a specific spell shouldn't be the assumption. Especially when the spell requires costly material components.

The principle still applies. Perhaps moreso since invocations are more abundant yet spell slots are still relatively scarce.

Since its a 30ft wall, he can use Mage Hand if a Wizard don't have his Familiar with him. Or are you going to say not all wizards pick Mage Hand as one of their cantrips?

Druids Wildshape can recharge on a short rest, can't say the same for that Level 1 spellslot unless you're a Land Druid. Rangers might have a pet with climb speed, or they can just climb the wall.

[Gignere]

Druids and Rangers don't have Find Familiar. A wizard may also not have his familiar on him, too. We can't forget that familiars are fragile and can die. There's also no guarantee the familiar you have on-hand can fly. Not saying its impossible or even unlikely, but there being a wizard with a specific spell shouldn't be the assumption. Especially when the spell requires costly material components.

The principle still applies. Perhaps moreso since invocations are more abundant yet spell slots are still relatively scarce.

Wouldn’t it be easier to just cast find familiar since it doesn’t cost a prep slot instead of preparing for jump for a 30 feet wall that you may not even encounter.

Also druids can use wildshape to cast find familiar now.

I think you are saying that jump is useful when there is a 30 feet wall and the wizard somehow are out of find familiar material. Because a wizard can always pull out a new familiar as long as he has mats. Doesn’t even require the spell to be prepped.

So you should prep it as a tertiary back up for an obstacle that may or may not be there, because over 30 feet you will need to burn misty step or fly or spider climb anyway, and when you happen to run out of find familiar mats.

Ok in my book that is useless.

[Ashrym]

The benefit of jump is that it doesn't require concentration. It's not a great spell but at least it has that one perk.

Giving up concentration can be a PITA and it saves a higher level slot for other uses.

Still not a great spell but it has minor benefits in that regard.

[Galithar]

The benefit of jump is that it doesn't require concentration. It's not a great spell but at least it has that one perk.

Giving up concentration can be a PITA and it saves a higher level slot for other uses.

Still not a great spell but it has minor benefits in that regard.

It also has a duration. You don't just get the one jump, you get a minute of jumping that can be given to someone else. Versus Misty Step a common "replacement" others keep saying that is self only and only once.

Imagine you're fighting in a open area of difficult terrain, AND the enemy gets to ignore it. Your Paladin can't keep up to Smite them. You cast jump and BAM he gets to "ignore" the difficult terrain too. He'll have to make a Dex (acrobatics) check when landing in the difficult terrain, so it's not without risk. But it's definitely got some good use even if it is pretty Niche.

You need to scale a 120 foot cliff to save someone at the top, you have less than a minute to get to them. Luckily there's a little outcropping every 20-30 feet! Jump will get you there for a level one spell. Again the scenario is pretty contrived, but it's not impossible. It's definitely UP in my opinion, but there's definitely worse spells. Like Witch Bolt that does almost nothing right.

[Chaosmancer]

I believe the point of move earth is to help to do foundations for houses and stuff like that: cast it a dozen of times and you can make a non flat place much better for building houses.
I do not think it was meant to be used as an adventuring tool but rather as an easy to sell spellcasting service that can occasionally be used for other things like when you decide you do like to flatten things like a minecraft player.

Um... that would make sense except that it is a 6th level spell.

Spellcasting services are priced for 1st and 2nd level spells. A 6th level spell having that distinction is far and away strange.

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It also has a duration. You don't just get the one jump, you get a minute of jumping that can be given to someone else. Versus Misty Step a common "replacement" others keep saying that is self only and only once.

Imagine you're fighting in a open area of difficult terrain, AND the enemy gets to ignore it. Your Paladin can't keep up to Smite them. You cast jump and BAM he gets to "ignore" the difficult terrain too. He'll have to make a Dex (acrobatics) check when landing in the difficult terrain, so it's not without risk. But it's definitely got some good use even if it is pretty Niche.

You need to scale a 120 foot cliff to save someone at the top, you have less than a minute to get to them. Luckily there's a little outcropping every 20-30 feet! Jump will get you there for a level one spell. Again the scenario is pretty contrived, but it's not impossible. It's definitely UP in my opinion, but there's definitely worse spells. Like Witch Bolt that does almost nothing right.

Yeah, those are horrifically contrived examples.

I mean, great that the Paladin can jump, but no one else can. So, how are the other players dealing with the enemy? Did we even need to make the paladin spring-heeled to deal with this fight? Couldn't they have just thrown javelins?

And for that cliff.... man, that reads exactly like "my players always prepare this spell so I've designed a challenge specifically to be overcome by it. And the very first thing my players would ask? "Well, how do the rest of us get up there?"


But yes, I'll concede. If you have less than a single minute to reach the top of a 120 ft cliff, with spacious and flat outcroppings every 20 ft making a perfect path up to the top of the cliff, and you only need a single party member to reach the top... Jump will do the job cheaper than your other options to accomplish that exact same job.

Not faster, just cheaper.

[Galithar]

Um... that would make sense except that it is a 6th level spell.

Spellcasting services are priced for 1st and 2nd level spells. A 6th level spell having that distinction is far and away strange.

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Yeah, those are horrifically contrived examples.

I mean, great that the Paladin can jump, but no one else can. So, how are the other players dealing with the enemy? Did we even need to make the paladin spring-heeled to deal with this fight? Couldn't they have just thrown javelins?

And for that cliff.... man, that reads exactly like "my players always prepare this spell so I've designed a challenge specifically to be overcome by it. And the very first thing my players would ask? "Well, how do the rest of us get up there?"


But yes, I'll concede. If you have less than a single minute to reach the top of a 120 ft cliff, with spacious and flat outcroppings every 20 ft making a perfect path up to the top of the cliff, and you only need a single party member to reach the top... Jump will do the job cheaper than your other options to accomplish that exact same job.

Not faster, just cheaper.

The cliffs is very contrived. The Difficult terrain can happen very easily. A number of creatures can create difficult terrain and then ignore by means of other abilities, or simply having a greater move speed. Also it's important for a Paladin to close to melee distance so they can Smite. A Javelin thrown is damage, but it's peanuts compared to a Greatsword Divine Smite with/without improved divine smite or a magic weapon.

Also, since it didn't take concentration of you really need multiple to get to melee range with the supposed creatures you can cast it again.

First level spells should not be some all powerful perfect answer to everything ability. They are good early game.

It didn't even have to be some best case scenario for Jump. Lots of times it's beneficial for a melee character (other than the caster) to clear an obstacle to get to a ranged enemy. Jump allows that with minimal resource expense. Misty Step never allows it, Dimension Door puts you in harms way as well, Fly may simply be too expensive or you aren't high enough level/chose other things above it.

Again, I'm not saying it's an amazing spell, but as soon as you step outside of the white room it has enough uses that I've had more than one character use it to great effect.

[Jerrykhor]

It didn't even have to be some best case scenario for Jump. Lots of times it's beneficial for a melee character (other than the caster) to clear an obstacle to get to a ranged enemy. Jump allows that with minimal resource expense.
You mean if the obstacle is low enough for you to clear the jump but high enough for Jump to look useful? Must be a very specific height.


Misty Step never allows it
Misty Step never allow for what? Apparently you have never encountered things you cannot physically get through, like caged walls. Ever tried jumping away from creatures? Yeah it triggers attack of opportunity. Misty Step however, does not allow it.


Dimension Door puts you in harms way as well
Then don't teleport in harms way? Or maybe I want to.


Again, I'm not saying it's an amazing spell, but as soon as you step outside of the white room it has enough uses that I've had more than one character use it to great effect.
You come up with extremely contrived scenarios where Jump would be useful, then tell me that I am using White Room theory to discredit Jump? I can't tell if you're trolling or not.


First level spells should not be some all powerful perfect answer to everything ability. They are good early game. The problem is that Jump is the answer to very few things, in very specific situations. Maybe the problem is not the spell, but the jump rules. The spell should at least remove the running start requirement though, and allow jumping more than your speed. Then it would be useful.

[SharkForce]

The problem though is Spider Climb.

Because you aren't going to be going inside Beholder Lairs, Mind Flayer Colonies, Fiend Fortresses or Gith Battlecruisers at level 1. You might not get to them before level 10.

So, the fact that Jump is a 1st level spell actually works against it because a 2nd level spell is of similar value, and Spider Climb is also going to provide the same or better access in those scenarios. After all, your maximum jump height even with Jump is... about 27 feet (3+mod of 5 is 8, multiplied by 3 is 24, add 1/2 of six foot height)? Impressive, but a 30 ft tube is completely unclearable, and you might take 2d6 fall damage from the attempt.

But if you can touch a wall, Spider Climb can allow you to clamber up an... yeah it lasts an hour, that is an arbitrarily huge area. 60 ft per round (dashing), 600 rounds.

So, in all of your examples... Spider Climb is still the more useful spell, and it is useful in more situations, and it is just as "cheap" for those high level adventures.

spider climb is every bit as single target as jump, and is also concentration so not only are you not casting it on multiple party members per spell, you are also just not going to get multiple party members at all (unless you are a sorcerer twinning it, I suppose).

jump is a level 1 spell. for what it is, it does the job reasonably well. at worst, it might be slightly below where it should be... but it does not remotely belong in the same category as find traps, witch bolt, or true strike. it is not hard at all to imagine a scenario where it takes one of your melee party members from barely contributing at all (one javelin per round) to contributing at basically full potential (being able to actually use their extra attacks because they can get into melee range) because they can jump over difficult terrain and medium-sized obstacles.

not being god-tier does not mean it sucks.

[Galithar]

You mean if the obstacle is low enough for you to clear the jump but high enough for Jump to look useful? Must be a very specific height.


Misty Step never allow for what? Apparently you have never encountered things you cannot physically get through, like caged walls. Ever tried jumping away from creatures? Yeah it triggers attack of opportunity. Misty Step however, does not allow it.


Then don't teleport in harms way? Or maybe I want to.


You come up with extremely contrived scenarios where Jump would be useful, then tell me that I am using White Room theory to discredit Jump? I can't tell if you're trolling or not.

The problem is that Jump is the answer to very few things, in very specific situations. Maybe the problem is not the spell, but the jump rules. The spell should at least remove the running start requirement though, and allow jumping more than your speed. Then it would be useful.

Obstacles doesn't need any height to be difficult to overcome. Jump a 15 foot gap. Jump over difficult terrain to not lose movement speed. Jump up onto a balcony.

Misty Step can never move an ALLY.

If your goal is to get your ALLY close to the enemy being required to go there yourself is a negative.

Think what you will, this will be my last response on the matter. Just because you can't see something doesn't mean it's not there.

The only problem with the spell is that it's an action cast time. Put it on a bonus action and it's suddenly way easier to work into your turn.

The additional distance sometimes makes up for still needing a running start, though that would be a bit of a buff that would definitely make the dorm easier to use. If you want to get to a balcony 15 feet directly above you. A 6 foot character needs only 6 foot of jump distance to grab that ledge. (Height + 1/2 height reach) Standing still that requires (6/3)*2 or a Strength mod of 4. (6 is the target, divided by 3 from jump, doubled from the lack of a running start) Meaning you can get your strength 18 melee buddy up to the enemy. Or an ally with a strength as low as 8 could make the same jump with a running start to potentially escape melee enemies on the ground. Obviously jumping up and grabbing a ledge and then pulling yourself up will vary based on character height and most DMs will require an athletics check for it. So the low Str ally may not want to try that unless they have something to offset their low strength on the proceeding check.

Yes, you have to LOOK for reasons to use the spell, but it can give a definite tactical advantage if your DM creates 3d battlefields and has a very low cost. Especially if the caster is the melee warrior themselves and would otherwise be out of attack range. This isn't always an option, and I personally have always used it as a full caster mostly to buff allies.

Yes, you CAN get the same results with other spells, if you want to use higher level spells and potentially your concentration also.

[JackPhoenix]

The biggest problem with jump is that it’s not a cantrip.

Which would make it *worse*. Cantrip slots are more limited than spells known or prepared.

[noob]

I still do not understand the policy of not letting people learn cantrips the way they learn other spells or why it caps out at so few cantrips.

[Thunderous Mojo]

The problem though is Spider Climb.

I find this a wild argument. 😀

If your neighbor receives a raise, you do not become poorer.
Fly is better than Spider Climb. Is the Fly spell "the problem" to the Spider Climb spell, they way you envision Spider Climb to be "the problem" for the Jump spell?

If, in the Return of the King novel, the Lord of Eagles fails his ability check to pick up Sam and Frodo from the river of lava, (at the conclusion of destroying Sauron's ring), the Spider Climb spell does them no good.

The Jump spell means a 10 Str Hobbit can jump 9 feet straight up, no Athletics check required.

Both Spider Climb and Jump are niche spells.


Because you aren't going to be going inside Beholder Lairs, Mind Flayer Colonies, Fiend Fortresses or Gith Battlecruisers at level 1. You might not get to them before level 10.


Chaosmancer..that is a presumption. The second 5e campaign I ran was a nautical/acquatic campaign inspired by sci-fantasy ala Dave Arneson, the Numenera and Gamma World RPG systems , as well as the sci-fi novels of Vernor Vinge.

In the 2nd adventure, the tides carried the characters ship to a large floating island made of metal, (it was really an ancient, lost Gith cruiser). The group later escaped after having achieved 5th level.

People's analysis are constrained by their perspectives. Politely, I suggest their are more perspectives that are viable, that most of us have considered.
(I include myself in that statement).

Anyway..back to the thread.

Thunderstep seems Underpowered to me. The spell does some damage, and you can teleport equipment and another creature...which is cool...(save the pack mule and kill monsters)... but Misty Step at 2nd level, and Dimension Door at 4th level strike me as more generally applicable overall.

[Pex]

Thunderstep seems Underpowered to me. The spell does some damage, and you can teleport equipment and another creature...which is cool...(save the pack mule and kill monsters)... but Misty Step at 2nd level, and Dimension Door at 4th level strike me as more generally applicable overall.

I don't agree. It's not a means of transportation. It's a means to get away from the bad guys without provoking an opportunity attack with the added benefit of damaging them in the process. Some spellcasters don't like being in melee. A particular situation could mean Misty Step is the better spell to use, but a spell doesn't need to have universal application nor be I Win The Combat to be good. That it can bring another creature along is part of what's so great about it. Get another party member out of the danger area too.

[Gignere]

Which would make it *worse*. Cantrip slots are more limited than spells known or prepared.

Not anymore wizards can swap on a long rest.

[valdier]

I find this a wild argument. 😀

If your neighbor receives a raise, you do not become poorer.

On a small scale, you do, in fact become poorer every time someone else other than you, gets a raise. That's how supply and demand, within an economy works. Their pay went up, the cost of goods has to go up to help cover that raise. You didn't get a raise and in theory would keep buying whatever their job produces, so... you in fact, get poorer.



Both Spider Climb and Jump are niche spells.

I would argue all movement spells are generally niche spells unless they have an immediate and direct application. Especially in the case of fast travel spells (you are going to get there when the DM wants you there regardless of magic).


Thunderstep seems Underpowered to me. The spell does some damage, and you can teleport equipment and another creature...which is cool...(save the pack mule and kill monsters)... but Misty Step at 2nd level, and Dimension Door at 4th level strike me as more generally applicable overall.

Thunderstep, I would agree is less useful than misty step, but far better than dimension door I think. The damage can actually be fairly decent with the right combinations of class/subclass options, and provides enough utility that it becomes my go-to movement spell at the level. It does slightly more than half of a fireballs damage in a small area. It does thunder which almost nothing resists. It lets you move an extra person with you, and pairs well with a storm sorcerer. Overall, it's a pretty decent utility spell that has combat applications. I think DDoor is the real loser here.

[Chaosmancer]

The cliffs is very contrived. The Difficult terrain can happen very easily. A number of creatures can create difficult terrain and then ignore by means of other abilities, or simply having a greater move speed. Also it's important for a Paladin to close to melee distance so they can Smite. A Javelin thrown is damage, but it's peanuts compared to a Greatsword Divine Smite with/without improved divine smite or a magic weapon.

Also, since it didn't take concentration of you really need multiple to get to melee range with the supposed creatures you can cast it again.

First level spells should not be some all powerful perfect answer to everything ability. They are good early game.

It didn't even have to be some best case scenario for Jump. Lots of times it's beneficial for a melee character (other than the caster) to clear an obstacle to get to a ranged enemy. Jump allows that with minimal resource expense. Misty Step never allows it, Dimension Door puts you in harms way as well, Fly may simply be too expensive or you aren't high enough level/chose other things above it.

Again, I'm not saying it's an amazing spell, but as soon as you step outside of the white room it has enough uses that I've had more than one character use it to great effect.



I think what you are missing is that the caster is using their action on a touch spell, to make the paladin more useful.

Sure, the paladin is doing far better damage if they can get in melee, but the Caster has to run into difficult terrain and use their action, so that next turn the Paladin can jump... lets see standing long jump is half, then triple, so 27 feet?

That means the enemy who is ignoring the difficult terrain is within 30 ft of the spellcaster?

Or, the caster could have done a damaging spell, working to end the fight sooner. Or a debuff on the enemy. Maybe this fight is about letting the ranged characters shine, so the Paladin is going to have a hard time of it, but the ranger is doing a good job.

And, usually an obstacle is just difficult terrain, which isn't that hard to clear, certainly losing 5 to 10 feet of movement isn't worth another characters full action during combat.

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spider climb is every bit as single target as jump, and is also concentration so not only are you not casting it on multiple party members per spell, you are also just not going to get multiple party members at all (unless you are a sorcerer twinning it, I suppose).

jump is a level 1 spell. for what it is, it does the job reasonably well. at worst, it might be slightly below where it should be... but it does not remotely belong in the same category as find traps, witch bolt, or true strike. it is not hard at all to imagine a scenario where it takes one of your melee party members from barely contributing at all (one javelin per round) to contributing at basically full potential (being able to actually use their extra attacks because they can get into melee range) because they can jump over difficult terrain and medium-sized obstacles.

not being god-tier does not mean it sucks.

There is no reason to have Spider Climb work for multiple allies. I mean, unless people are spending all four 1st level spells on Jump, they aren't getting all of their allies jumping either, and Spider Climb allows for pitons and rope to make a path for their allies.

Which jump doesn't allow for unless you have conveniently placed ledges


And sure, if you have a massive area of difficult terrain, and enemies that can ignore that terrain, and a caster who gets in touch range, and uses their action, and the paladin can jump and not fall prone, then Jump can be useful. But, it isn't even neccesary. The paladin can just throw Javelins. At 5th level the caster could do hypnotic pattern to stop the enemies instead of using jump on their ally. Or haste, which has other benefits.

Maybe this isn't that big of a fight, so those spells are overkill? Then the paladin being slightly less effective isn't a huge deal.

It belongs with those other spells, because even in the situations it is ideal for... it isn't necessary or even the best choice.

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I find this a wild argument. 😀

If your neighbor receives a raise, you do not become poorer.
Fly is better than Spider Climb. Is the Fly spell "the problem" to the Spider Climb spell, they way you envision Spider Climb to be "the problem" for the Jump spell?

If, in the Return of the King novel, the Lord of Eagles fails his ability check to pick up Sam and Frodo from the river of lava, (at the conclusion of destroying Sauron's ring), the Spider Climb spell does them no good.

The Jump spell means a 10 Str Hobbit can jump 9 feet straight up, no Athletics check required.

Both Spider Climb and Jump are niche spells.

I would argue spider climb has many uses, making it more than Niche. But opinions can vary on that.

But, you seem to have missed my argument entirely. The scenarios you proposed were all high level scenarios. But, at that point, a second level spell is just as cheap as a first. So, a spell that does everything jump is supposed to accomplish in those scenarios, longer and more effectively is not your neighbor getting a raise. It is having better tool for the job at hand

Also, yeah man, I'll give you that if I have two hobbits, on an island of rock, surrounded by lava and a Giant Eagle swoops down to grab them, and misses one of them, and that Hobbit is a spellcaster, and they cast jump to jump up and grab the Eagle, because the lava would have killed them if they waited another turn for the Eagle, the spell was useful.

But since most of my spellcasters aren't hobbits on the side of an erupting Mount Doom being rescued by Eagles, I don't think I really need it.

Oh, and Misty Step to the back of the Eagle, much more likely to succeed.




Chaosmancer..that is a presumption. The second 5e campaign I ran was a nautical/acquatic campaign inspired by sci-fantasy ala Dave Arneson, the Numenera and Gamma World RPG systems , as well as the sci-fi novels of Vernor Vinge.

In the 2nd adventure, the tides carried the characters ship to a large floating island made of metal, (it was really an ancient, lost Gith cruiser). The group later escaped after having achieved 5th level.

People's analysis are constrained by their perspectives. Politely, I suggest their are more perspectives that are viable, that most of us have considered.
(I include myself in that statement).

Sure, but... that isn't a typical campaign, is it? And spider climb would likely have been just as, if not more useful than Jump, as I said.

So, sure, I could tell the next player than asks me about Jump that if they end up on a crashed Gith Cruiser it is useful, but they are going to see that as "this spell isn't useful" because the chances of that are pretty low.



Anyway..back to the thread.

Thunderstep seems Underpowered to me. The spell does some damage, and you can teleport equipment and another creature...which is cool...(save the pack mule and kill monsters)... but Misty Step at 2nd level, and Dimension Door at 4th level strike me as more generally applicable overall.

The moving another creature and damage are very good. I've seen a guy who takes this spell every opportunity, and being able to move someone else in a teleport by 5th level is widely applicable.

It isn't the best spell ever, but it does very well in a dangerous combat situation.

[SharkForce]

the melee character isn't necessarily in the difficult terrain when you cast the jump spell, so no, the caster doesn't need to go into difficult terrain. they might need to... it certainly is a possibility... but a requirement? no.

nor is it a requirement that the melee character must land in difficult terrain at the end of the jump. or that they have no ability to get a running start. nor is it impossible that the wizard is already concentrating on something, and jump is a cheap no-concentration action to use in the second round instead of casting a crappy firebolt spell or whatever.

(as to the point about it being single-target, it keeps being brought up that spider climb is better, and that jump is bad because it is single-target. see the problem here? we're running a double standard)

I mean, sure, if we invent all kinds of weird assumptions designed to make jump look worse and insist that they must apply every time the spell is cast, jump looks worse.

if we don't add all kinds of arbitrary extra restraints and insist they will always be present, then it doesn't look that bad. it certainly doesn't look *amazing* or anything; the spell could use a little boost. but it doesn't belong in a thread about the worst balanced spells. there are some really incredibly terrible spells out there, and jump is leaps and bounds ahead of them (pun intended).

as far as spider climb being useful because you can go first and place pitons and such for the rest of the party... why? how does that make it meaningfully better? everyone can already climb anyways, with no chance of falling, at least under normal circumstances anyways. the lead person can just put in pitons whether they have spider climb on them or not. unless of course it's a combat scenario, in which case the spider climb person is going to want to be grabbing on anyways because if the caster loses concentration, they're either using the same method of climbing as everyone else or else they're going to be taking a dirt nap.

[Ashrym]

Spiderclimb isn't great either. It's a 2nd level spell that costs concentration to do what characters replicate with checks and equipment. The main benefit is the movement rate.

[Jerrykhor]

Spiderclimb isn't great either. It's a 2nd level spell that costs concentration to do what characters replicate with checks and equipment. The main benefit is the movement rate.

That's a bold claim. What equipment allow you to stand/walk on ceilings? I may not rate Jump, but I would not say that skill checks and equipment can replicate it.

[micahaphone]

Thunder Step is great, even if you're not a normally frontline character. Combat is swingy enough that your beefy fighter might fail a hold person or get slammed by some lucky crits, and suddenly they need an out and can't move. Cue friendly caster ally who can run into the thick of things, grab their friend's hand, and poof they're both gone. You can also do this with Dimension Door, but the lower slot is nice and the parting gift is very fun.

[Chaosmancer]

the melee character isn't necessarily in the difficult terrain when you cast the jump spell, so no, the caster doesn't need to go into difficult terrain. they might need to... it certainly is a possibility... but a requirement? no.

nor is it a requirement that the melee character must land in difficult terrain at the end of the jump. or that they have no ability to get a running start. nor is it impossible that the wizard is already concentrating on something, and jump is a cheap no-concentration action to use in the second round instead of casting a crappy firebolt spell or whatever.

(as to the point about it being single-target, it keeps being brought up that spider climb is better, and that jump is bad because it is single-target. see the problem here? we're running a double standard)

See, I never started with Jump is bad because it is single target. The single target point only comes up because Jump can only get a single person into position. Meaning that for a combat situation, it is limited.

Spider Climb is also only able to get one person into position, this is true, but the positions it can reach far exceed what Jump is capable of. Jump can get you across a gap, or up onto a balcony. Spider Climb can let you hang from a ceiling. Jump lasts only a minute, Spider Climb lasts an hour. These factors actually do matter, because they provide versatility.

Spider Climb us far from perfect, it has flaws, but the thing it does (allow you to walk on any surface at any angle, and hang there) is far superior to what Jump does (let you jump farther)

And the scenario I was given was difficult terrain that the enemy can run through with no problem, and the Paladin needing to get to them to be effective. If the advantage of the enemy is being able to ignore the difficult terrain, then that is where the fight is taking place. If this is just a single patch of difficult terrain and the enemy is just on the other side (a scenario implied by being able to take a running jump and landing outside of difficult terrain) then you are looking at a patch about 30 ft large, right? So instead of the wizard wasting their action, the Paladin can waste theirs dashing to the other side of the terrain.

And meanwhile, the wizard could cast other spells. The example specified Extra attack, so we are talking a 5th level wizard. Even if I assume no concentration that leaves Chromatic orb for 3d8 damage, Magic Missile, Scorching Ray, or shatter.

Maybe they aren't concentrating and I could use a defensive spell to protect against the ranged attacks, or Web to lock the enemies in place, Hold Person, Flaming Sphere, Suggestion

I just can't find a scenario where Jump is the best option that isn't highly contrived or only saves mild amount of time.




as far as spider climb being useful because you can go first and place pitons and such for the rest of the party... why? how does that make it meaningfully better? everyone can already climb anyways, with no chance of falling, at least under normal circumstances anyways. the lead person can just put in pitons whether they have spider climb on them or not. unless of course it's a combat scenario, in which case the spider climb person is going to want to be grabbing on anyways because if the caster loses concentration, they're either using the same method of climbing as everyone else or else they're going to be taking a dirt nap.

Because some DMs have "man at the gym" about climbing, so I included it to head off that discussion.

I had a character who had a full climb speed, and the DM wanted to tell me that I could not climb a stone wall because it was too tall. The only reason they allowed it is because I dashed and had movement to reach the top and complete it in a single round. If I couldn't have done that, they would have had me fall off the wall and be unable to climb it.

Heck, I've had DMs force athletics rolls for climbing a 10 ft tall crumbling brick wall, or a tree.

Also, some of those examples like the Gith ship would have logically meant "smooth metal walls" which the DM might say that you cannot climb because they are too smooth. However, with Spider Climb you can climb them, and with a hammer and pitons, create anchor points. It would be loud, but stealth wasn't being talked about.

[Pex]

Because some DMs have "man at the gym" about climbing, so I included it to head off that discussion.

I had a character who had a full climb speed, and the DM wanted to tell me that I could not climb a stone wall because it was too tall. The only reason they allowed it is because I dashed and had movement to reach the top and complete it in a single round. If I couldn't have done that, they would have had me fall off the wall and be unable to climb it.

Heck, I've had DMs force athletics rolls for climbing a 10 ft tall crumbling brick wall, or a tree.

Also, some of those examples like the Gith ship would have logically meant "smooth metal walls" which the DM might say that you cannot climb because they are too smooth. However, with Spider Climb you can climb them, and with a hammer and pitons, create anchor points. It would be loud, but stealth wasn't being talked about.

https://i.postimg.cc/Z5hvFkPN/umnevermind.gif
:smallwink::smallbiggrin:

[TheUser]

My dudes, when you realize that contingency can have triggers your PC isn't even aware of you realise how absolutely bonkers strong it is.

[Asisreo1]

My dudes, when you realize that contingency can have triggers your PC isn't even aware of you realise how absolutely bonkers strong it is.
Its also kinda risky since you never know if a trigger may activate preemptively due to false positives.

The easiest example (though obviously wasteful) would be Contingency-Dimension Door with a hostile creature being within 5ft as a trigger. Well, it would be nice if a hostile creature worth the 6th and 4th level spell slot gets within 5ft but if a goblin or even a hostile spider ends up getting within 5ft of you, you'll teleport regardless. So being mindful of triggers are extremely important.

Also, the one thing about Contingency is that the components are not something you could say is common. You can argue diamonds are available in a big city or ruby dust may be offered from a magical academy, but Contingency needs an ivory stauette of the spellcaster worth 1500gp. That's not something that you'll just find on a shopkeeper's shelf.

If a player wants it, it needs to be crafted. And per the DMG rules, it takes 750gp worth of Ivory and gems combined as well as 150 days of downtime dedicated only to this activity. It takes quite a while just to have a single spell prepared, and it would be devastating if it got lost, stolen, or destroyed.

[MaxWilson]

Its also kinda risky since you never know if a trigger may activate preemptively due to false positives.

The easiest example (though obviously wasteful) would be Contingency-Dimension Door with a hostile creature being within 5ft as a trigger. Well, it would be nice if a hostile creature worth the 6th and 4th level spell slot gets within 5ft but if a goblin or even a hostile spider ends up getting within 5ft of you, you'll teleport regardless. So being mindful of triggers are extremely important.

Also, the one thing about Contingency is that the components are not something you could say is common. You can argue diamonds are available in a big city or ruby dust may be offered from a magical academy, but Contingency needs an ivory stauette of the spellcaster worth 1500gp. That's not something that you'll just find on a shopkeeper's shelf.

If a player wants it, it needs to be crafted. And per the DMG rules, it takes 750gp worth of Ivory and gems combined as well as 150 days of downtime dedicated only to this activity. It takes quite a while just to have a single spell prepared, and it would be devastating if it got lost, stolen, or destroyed.

Or Fabricate one out of ivory in ten minutes, if you know Fabricate and have some kind of proficiency in carving.

[Thunderous Mojo]

I don't agree. It's not a means of transportation. It's a means to get away from the bad guys without provoking an opportunity attack with the added benefit of damaging them in the process. Some spellcasters don't like being in melee. A particular situation could mean Misty Step is the better spell to use, but a spell doesn't need to have universal application nor be I Win The Combat to be good. That it can bring another creature along is part of what's so great about it. Get another party member out of the danger area too.

I agree with all of this. Thunderstep, alas, uses the same resource that powers essential spells like Dispel Magic: Third Level spell slots.

The guaranteed damage that Thunderstep does, as you state above, is not encounter changing. A use of Dispel Magic, often is, (indeed), encounter altering, (or, at least keeping you alive).

Thunderstep, like Misty Step, suffers from the issue of needing to see where you are teleporting to. Dimension Door doesn't suffer from this restriction.

When Guards and Wards triggers, DD is still good to go, with a 500' range. You can literally "head someone off at the pass" with Dimension Door.

(DD can also be used to decline any Chase Scenes your DM offers😀)

Ultimately, I just find, with careful play..(scouting, Scrying, stealth,etc), I can escape the need to have an Emergency GtFO spell. I can work around the Thunderstep spell.

Sometimes you just need a Dispel Magic or Counterspell.

[Ashrym]

That's a bold claim. What equipment allow you to stand/walk on ceilings? I may not rate Jump, but I would not say that skill checks and equipment can replicate it.

Athletics and a climber's kit work fine most of the time without needing concentration or a spell slot. The need to stand upside down on a ceiling isn't common enough to make the spell impressive.

[SharkForce]

See, I never started with Jump is bad because it is single target. The single target point only comes up because Jump can only get a single person into position. Meaning that for a combat situation, it is limited.

Spider Climb is also only able to get one person into position, this is true, but the positions it can reach far exceed what Jump is capable of. Jump can get you across a gap, or up onto a balcony. Spider Climb can let you hang from a ceiling. Jump lasts only a minute, Spider Climb lasts an hour. These factors actually do matter, because they provide versatility.
how many people do you need to get into range? 1 person is likely to be 50% of the party that needs to move in close to begin with.


Spider Climb us far from perfect, it has flaws, but the thing it does (allow you to walk on any surface at any angle, and hang there) is far superior to what Jump does (let you jump farther)

spider climb won't get you over a chasm in open terrain. spider climb won't let you jump into the air and hit a flying enemy who is out of normal reach. spider climb won't let you keep concentrating on your crowd control. there scenarios where jump, a lower level non-concentration spell, is superior to spider climb. there are situations where spider climb, the much longer-lasting spell that is higher level and requires concentration, is superior to jump. this does not point to jump being among the most underpowered spells. it may not be amazing. but again, we're talking about stuff like find traps, here, and jump is nowhere remotely *near* that level of useless.


And the scenario I was given was difficult terrain that the enemy can run through with no problem, and the Paladin needing to get to them to be effective. If the advantage of the enemy is being able to ignore the difficult terrain, then that is where the fight is taking place. If this is just a single patch of difficult terrain and the enemy is just on the other side (a scenario implied by being able to take a running jump and landing outside of difficult terrain) then you are looking at a patch about 30 ft large, right? So instead of the wizard wasting their action, the Paladin can waste theirs dashing to the other side of the terrain.

or the wizard could cast this spell before the paladin goes into the difficult terrain.


And meanwhile, the wizard could cast other spells. The example specified Extra attack, so we are talking a 5th level wizard. Even if I assume no concentration that leaves Chromatic orb for 3d8 damage, Magic Missile, Scorching Ray, or shatter.

I mean, you could use those options, but 3d8 damage is probably less than the difference between the paladin throwing a javelin vs the paladin being able to jump over the difficult terrain. especially if they need to move over the difficult terrain more than once.

frankly, most of those options don't even sound much better than "just go somewhere and hide so you don't lose your concentration".


Maybe they aren't concentrating and I could use a defensive spell to protect against the ranged attacks, or Web to lock the enemies in place, Hold Person, Flaming Sphere, Suggestion

I just can't find a scenario where Jump is the best option that isn't highly contrived or only saves mild amount of time.

one round early in the fight is a big deal. and melee paladin is massively superior to javelin paladin. it isn't even close.

but sure, if the fight is worth a web or something like that, and you haven't already used your concentration, it is probably more worth your action to cast web.

but again, we don't need a scenario where jump is the *best* option. we're not looking for "slightly below average" spells. we're looking for the *most* underpowered spells (or the most overpowered spells, but nobody is arguing that jump is anywhere close to that). if jump is able to give reasonably worthwhile uses for your action and a level 1 spell slot at some point in the game, it is definitely not among the most underpowered spells, because there are spells that are so bad that it is nearly impossible to imagine *any* use for them at any level for any reason.

again, look at the competition: find traps (so terrible that it can't even detect itself). true strike (useful only if you have a free round to cast it this turn so that you can get advantage on one attack next turn, against a target that was within 30 feet of you during this turn, but only if they haven't moved away or become less important or already died or you already would have advantage). weird (oh goody, a level 9 spell that can be blocked by a reasonably common immunity, causes a mediocre condition, allows a save against a saving throw that is commonly good each round, and does terrible damage). acid arrow (6d4 (avg 15) damage over 2 rounds on an attack roll over two rounds. note that chromatic orb does 4d8 (average 18) damage instantly in that second level spell slot, and has flexible damage type to offer, and frankly still isn't even all that wonderful of a spell). mordenkainen's sword (absolutely abysmal damage from such a high level spell). witch bolt (useful only on targets that can't move, basically. well, until level 5, at which point it's competing with 2d10 damage from firebolt for the round-by-round damage and costs concentration).

there are some spectacularly bad spells out there. jump would need to be incredibly terrible to deserve a spot alongside spells like these.


Because some DMs have "man at the gym" about climbing, so I included it to head off that discussion.

I had a character who had a full climb speed, and the DM wanted to tell me that I could not climb a stone wall because it was too tall. The only reason they allowed it is because I dashed and had movement to reach the top and complete it in a single round. If I couldn't have done that, they would have had me fall off the wall and be unable to climb it.

Heck, I've had DMs force athletics rolls for climbing a 10 ft tall crumbling brick wall, or a tree.

"DMs might invent terrible house rules" is not a reasonable basis for discussion.



Also, some of those examples like the Gith ship would have logically meant "smooth metal walls" which the DM might say that you cannot climb because they are too smooth. However, with Spider Climb you can climb them, and with a hammer and pitons, create anchor points. It would be loud, but stealth wasn't being talked about.

who says the walls would have been smooth? that gith ship was noted as having sat in salt water long enough to be described as ancient.

[heavyfuel]

"DMs might invent terrible house rules" is not a reasonable basis for discussion.

It is a perfectly reasonable basis for discussion, however, let's go further: What about published adventures that consistently call for Athletics checks to climb?

Those aren't houserules. Those are DCs printed on books published by WotC.

The PHB doesn't define what "few handholds" or "slippery" means, so anything less than a ladder might be considered a "few". That's not a houserule either, that's personal interpretation.

[Chaosmancer]

how many people do you need to get into range? 1 person is likely to be 50% of the party that needs to move in close to begin with.

Query: If 50% of the party does not need to use jump, why is 25% of that using their turn to get 25% of the other half of the party into range?

Basically, if you have two ranged characters and two melee characters, why is one of the ranged characters using their turn to get one melee person into range? If only one person is needed to target that enemy, then we have two people already targeting them.

And sure, there are reasons, but this is the math that needs to be done, is it worth not using your action to set up someone elses action?




1) spider climb won't get you over a chasm in open terrain. 2) spider climb won't let you jump into the air and hit a flying enemy who is out of normal reach. 3) spider climb won't let you keep concentrating on your crowd control. 4) there scenarios where jump, a lower level non-concentration spell, is superior to spider climb. there are situations where spider climb, the much longer-lasting spell that is higher level and requires concentration, is superior to jump. this does not point to jump being among the most underpowered spells. it may not be amazing. but again, we're talking about stuff like find traps, here, and jump is nowhere remotely *near* that level of useless.

Adding numbers for ease of sorting.

1) This is why you tie a rope into a noose and throw it around an anchor, then you can cross without spell slot

2) This usually nets you a single attack, and as was mentioned, Jump does not make you immune to fall damage, so a DM might have you jump 20 ft, take 2d6 and deal a single attack. Or... you can use a ranged weapon and get two attacks. Are you less effective? Yes, but you just established that half the party likely has a focus on range, so they are doing just fine.

3) If you are concentrating on a crowd control spell... how important is the jump action? I mean, is every enemy you are controlling on the other side of that chasm on a flat plain?

4) Look, if your entire point is that Jump is not the worst hot piece of garbage ever penned into the PHB (Find Traps) then you win. I'd never say it was that bad. Find Traps is clearly a worse spell. True Strike is a worse spell. But Jump is a bad spell. It is not generally worth knowing. The situations people seem to be using it in seem to either be using it unnecessarily because a mundane solution would accomplish the same goal, completely devalue the math of losing an action mid-combat by assuming that giving someone else the ability to operate efficiently instead of inefficiently is somehow worth it, or are so contrived they are clearly only showing up because the DM feels bad that someone took Jump.

Is it the worst spell in the game? No. Not even close, there are far worse spells. Is it an underpowered spell that is bad to have? Yes.






I mean, you could use those options, but 3d8 damage is probably less than the difference between the paladin throwing a javelin vs the paladin being able to jump over the difficult terrain. especially if they need to move over the difficult terrain more than once.

frankly, most of those options don't even sound much better than "just go somewhere and hide so you don't lose your concentration".

Sorry, but dead wrong. Assuming everything hits. Paladin has a +4 mod, does not use any spell slots

Jump -> Wizard 0 damage, Paladin two longsword attacks with dueling 2d8+12, average total: 21

Chromatic Orb -> Wizard 3d8 (13.5), Paladin single attack (even though they could use their item interaction to draw a second javelin and throw it) 1d6+4: Total: 20.5

Scorching Ray -> Wizard 6d6 (21), Paladin single attack 1d6+4: Total, 28.5

So, Chromatic Orb and Jump on the Paladin (assuming no Divine Smite) is pretty much identical. And Chromatic Orb can be used... when the Paladin doesn't need to jump. Meanwhile, Scorching Ray is superior, unless the Paladin smites, which will then be equivalent.


Now, sure, the more smiting the paladin does, the better the Jump spell looks in this analysis, but here is a quick hot take.

Jump is a great spell for Paladins to have on their spell list, not wizards. Because the only people who seem to benefit from it are paladins who need to get into melee with someone they can't reach. But for a wizard, I'm really not seeing the benefits here, when their own actions are just as valuable as the Paladins.



one round early in the fight is a big deal. and melee paladin is massively superior to javelin paladin. it isn't even close.

Sure and a Wizard casting Web is massively superior to one casting Jump. Just because the Paladin is more effective in melee doesn't mean it is my sole responsibility to get them there at the cost of my actions. Can that be the right decision? Maybe, but it isn't a guarantee that getting the Paladin into position is superior to me taking my normal actions and the paladin being a bit inefficient for one fight.




but again, we don't need a scenario where jump is the *best* option. we're not looking for "slightly below average" spells. we're looking for the *most* underpowered spells (or the most overpowered spells, but nobody is arguing that jump is anywhere close to that). if jump is able to give reasonably worthwhile uses for your action and a level 1 spell slot at some point in the game, it is definitely not among the most underpowered spells, because there are spells that are so bad that it is nearly impossible to imagine *any* use for them at any level for any reason.

again, look at the competition: find traps (so terrible that it can't even detect itself). true strike (useful only if you have a free round to cast it this turn so that you can get advantage on one attack next turn, against a target that was within 30 feet of you during this turn, but only if they haven't moved away or become less important or already died or you already would have advantage). weird (oh goody, a level 9 spell that can be blocked by a reasonably common immunity, causes a mediocre condition, allows a save against a saving throw that is commonly good each round, and does terrible damage). acid arrow (6d4 (avg 15) damage over 2 rounds on an attack roll over two rounds. note that chromatic orb does 4d8 (average 18) damage instantly in that second level spell slot, and has flexible damage type to offer, and frankly still isn't even all that wonderful of a spell). mordenkainen's sword (absolutely abysmal damage from such a high level spell). witch bolt (useful only on targets that can't move, basically. well, until level 5, at which point it's competing with 2d10 damage from firebolt for the round-by-round damage and costs concentration).

there are some spectacularly bad spells out there. jump would need to be incredibly terrible to deserve a spot alongside spells like these.

Look, if your entire point is that Jump is number 12 on the top ten list of the worst spells in DnD 5e, sure, I'll give you that victory. You might be able to find a use for Acid Arrow, maybe, but Witch bolt is one that I already rewrite because it is so useless as written.

But that doesn't mean Jump is even average. It is clearly below average. I'd find more use for Illusory Script than I ever would for Jump. But, again, I will fully concede that worse spells exist.




"DMs might invent terrible house rules" is not a reasonable basis for discussion.

who says the walls would have been smooth? that gith ship was noted as having sat in salt water long enough to be described as ancient.


"DMs have used these rules, and so I preemptively explained how this spell is useful even with these rules" is a reasonable basis.

If you don't like it? Okay. I don't really care, it wasn't put in for you. It was put in to avoid the discussion that no one could possibly follow the spider climber because they can't climb those surfaces.

But, I will note, if these surfaces are so easily climbable... why did you need Jump to cross them again? The entire point of that example I was responding to is that jump could be used to navigate a dungeon that was built vertically. By the necessity of using Jump, they are implying that the PCs could not simply climb the walls and other surfaces. If they could... you don't need Jump either.

[MaxWilson]

But, I will note, if these surfaces are so easily climbable... why did you need Jump to cross them again? The entire point of that example I was responding to is that jump could be used to navigate a dungeon that was built vertically. By the necessity of using Jump, they are implying that the PCs could not simply climb the walls and other surfaces. If they could... you don't need Jump either.

Dungeons with massive verticality are so great, if a little hard to run. It occurs to me that Githyanki strongpoints should definitely have vertical chokepoints to take advantage of their built-in 3/day Jump capability. I wonder what a dungeon specifically built to exploit Jump ought to look like.

[SharkForce]

Query: If 50% of the party does not need to use jump, why is 25% of that using their turn to get 25% of the other half of the party into range?

Basically, if you have two ranged characters and two melee characters, why is one of the ranged characters using their turn to get one melee person into range? If only one person is needed to target that enemy, then we have two people already targeting them.

And sure, there are reasons, but this is the math that needs to be done, is it worth not using your action to set up someone elses action?

50% of the party are probably ranged, but one of them (the wizard/sorcerer/bard/etc) is probably significantly worse at ranged damage than the other (rogue/ranger/ranged fighter/EB warlock/whatever), while 50% of the party are probably melee but one of them (the strength-based fighter/paladin/barbarian/melee warlock etc) is also probably far better at dealing melee damage than the other (cleric/melee artificer/druid/monk etc).

so basically, we're trading bad ranged damage for good melee damage. the trade is actually effecient that the wizard doing 0 damage this turn in exchange for the melee damage character doing full damage is actually slightly better than the wizard casting a damage spell of the same level as jump, even when the melee damage character isn't a specialized damage build (no polearm mastery, for example). (as for scorching ray, that spell is terrible at level 5. you're giving up one of your big guns to make your damage slightly better than a non-damage-oriented character's at-will damage. at level 10 or something the resource cost is less, but the value of your 6d6 damage has gone down significantly).






Adding numbers for ease of sorting.

1) This is why you tie a rope into a noose and throw it around an anchor, then you can cross without spell slot

2) This usually nets you a single attack, and as was mentioned, Jump does not make you immune to fall damage, so a DM might have you jump 20 ft, take 2d6 and deal a single attack. Or... you can use a ranged weapon and get two attacks. Are you less effective? Yes, but you just established that half the party likely has a focus on range, so they are doing just fine.

3) If you are concentrating on a crowd control spell... how important is the jump action? I mean, is every enemy you are controlling on the other side of that chasm on a flat plain?

4) Look, if your entire point is that Jump is not the worst hot piece of garbage ever penned into the PHB (Find Traps) then you win. I'd never say it was that bad. Find Traps is clearly a worse spell. True Strike is a worse spell. But Jump is a bad spell. It is not generally worth knowing. The situations people seem to be using it in seem to either be using it unnecessarily because a mundane solution would accomplish the same goal, completely devalue the math of losing an action mid-combat by assuming that giving someone else the ability to operate efficiently instead of inefficiently is somehow worth it, or are so contrived they are clearly only showing up because the DM feels bad that someone took Jump.

Is it the worst spell in the game? No. Not even close, there are far worse spells. Is it an underpowered spell that is bad to have? Yes.

1) in the middle of combat? have fun crawling across your rope (which may have missed) while the enemies cut it.

2) since when? I can make full attacks in the middle of my movement, and jumping is just movement. and it isn't a fall, it's a jump. the DM can be a **** to anyone, but I don't see the point in assuming that your DM is out to get you.

3) I'm not even sure what your point is here. but the value of allowing someone else to contribute in full (thus making the whole group more effective overall) can certainly be significant. if you wanted to do damage yourself, why are you a spellcaster in the first place?

4) that is literally what this thread is about. what are the *most* underpowered or *most* overpowered spells. stuff that is a little below where it should be need not apply, just as stuff that is a little above where it should be need not apply. a caster could take jump and find useful ways to use the spell. they aren't necessarily absolutely 100% the best. but they're not terrible either.



Sorry, but dead wrong. Assuming everything hits. Paladin has a +4 mod, does not use any spell slots

Jump -> Wizard 0 damage, Paladin two longsword attacks with dueling 2d8+12, average total: 21

Chromatic Orb -> Wizard 3d8 (13.5), Paladin single attack (even though they could use their item interaction to draw a second javelin and throw it) 1d6+4: Total: 20.5

Scorching Ray -> Wizard 6d6 (21), Paladin single attack 1d6+4: Total, 28.5

So, Chromatic Orb and Jump on the Paladin (assuming no Divine Smite) is pretty much identical. And Chromatic Orb can be used... when the Paladin doesn't need to jump. Meanwhile, Scorching Ray is superior, unless the Paladin smites, which will then be equivalent.

so, by the math, using a level 1 jump spell adds just as much damage (well, very slightly more, but I'm not going to quibble over half a hit point worth of damage) as using a level 1 damage spell, assuming the paladin doesn't have any magic items, doesn't have any damage-boosting feats, and is not using one of the higher-damage weapons available to them, plus could potentially be useful in other places, and will continue to get further ahead as levels increase and the paladin's damage increases with it, and also assuming the jump is only needed a single time in the entire combat. not sure how you get "dead wrong" from that.

and again, here you go comparing jump to a level 2 spell and saying "look, it's worse than a level 2 spell, that must mean it's terrible". that doesn't make any sense at all. jump is a level 1 spell, the rational comparison is to look at other level 1 spells and see how it is doing.



Now, sure, the more smiting the paladin does, the better the Jump spell looks in this analysis, but here is a quick hot take.

Jump is a great spell for Paladins to have on their spell list, not wizards. Because the only people who seem to benefit from it are paladins who need to get into melee with someone they can't reach. But for a wizard, I'm really not seeing the benefits here, when their own actions are just as valuable as the Paladins.

again: if you didn't want to play support to, what are you doing playing a wizard in the first place? if making the party more effective with your spells by supporting allies and disabling enemies is not what you wanted to do, why did you choose the class that is amazing at doing that and mediocre at doing the damage you seem to want to do? build an archer fighter, or a warlock, or some other damage build. something that does comparable damage to your resource-expending wizard, except without the need to expend resources so that you never need to worry about whether it's worth the resource expenditure.

that said: if "[j]ump is a great spell for Paladins to have on their spell list", then how is it even *remotely* fit to be described as one of the most underpowered spells in the game?



Sure and a Wizard casting Web is massively superior to one casting Jump. Just because the Paladin is more effective in melee doesn't mean it is my sole responsibility to get them there at the cost of my actions. Can that be the right decision? Maybe, but it isn't a guarantee that getting the Paladin into position is superior to me taking my normal actions and the paladin being a bit inefficient for one fight.

again, level 2 spell vs level 1 spell. this is not a rational basis for comparison. yes, web is probably more valuable in a sufficiently challenging fight that requires it. no, it is not reasonable to compare a level 2 spell to a level 1 spell and conclude that the level 1 spell is bad as a result of being worse than the level 2 spell. we could make a conclusion like that the other way round; for example, acid arrow being worse than chromatic orb in a level 2 spell slot, when chromatic orb has extra utility and acid arrow doesn't, is a reasonable argument that acid arrow is a terrible spell (though acid arrow does have a tiny upside in that a miss still does a tiny bit of damage, I'm not remotely convinced that's enough to salvage anything).


Look, if your entire point is that Jump is number 12 on the top ten list of the worst spells in DnD 5e, sure, I'll give you that victory. You might be able to find a use for Acid Arrow, maybe, but Witch bolt is one that I already rewrite because it is so useless as written.

But that doesn't mean Jump is even average. It is clearly below average. I'd find more use for Illusory Script than I ever would for Jump. But, again, I will fully concede that worse spells exist.

I'm not convinced it's even close to being number 12 on the list of the 10 worst spells. it's probably a little under where it should be. but it is not a lot under where it should be.


"DMs have used these rules, and so I preemptively explained how this spell is useful even with these rules" is a reasonable basis.

If you don't like it? Okay. I don't really care, it wasn't put in for you. It was put in to avoid the discussion that no one could possibly follow the spider climber because they can't climb those surfaces.

But, I will note, if these surfaces are so easily climbable... why did you need Jump to cross them again? The entire point of that example I was responding to is that jump could be used to navigate a dungeon that was built vertically. By the necessity of using Jump, they are implying that the PCs could not simply climb the walls and other surfaces. If they could... you don't need Jump either.

DMs have ignored the rules that are in the book to make up bad rules is still not a reasonable basis for comparison. we have official rules. those make a reasonable basis for comparison because everyone has equal access to them; I can look them up, you can look them up, everyone else can look them up, and we're all starting from the same point. your DM's crappy house rules are only available to your DM's table. I can't look them up, quite frankly you probably can't even look them up until they get dumped on you in the middle of a session, and nobody else out there can look them up. they may exist, but there is no way for me or anyone else who doesn't play at your table to use them to rate the value of *anything* because they may as well not exist as far as anyone else is concerned.

as for why you might need jump: same reason you sometimes want spider climb: it doesn't slow you down. moving at full speed instead of half (or 1/4, in the case of spells like plant growth or transmute rock to mud, or not at all in the case of spells that immobilize you, or while avoiding damage in case of spells like spike growth) is a great benefit when time pressures are a concern. for example, in the middle of pitched combat. being able to do that at a low resource cost (level 1 spell and most importantly no concentration) is a handy ability to have.

[Tharkun]

From memory...

So UP is something I would struggle to find a reason to take. Some spells are pretty bad but might have their niche or be good in the right campaign. So Mislead is a bad spell... but there are cases where it is in fact the spell you want. They are just rare.

Mislead doesn't actually work. It was obviously written before they fully defined how invisibility and hide works.

I have a whole bunch of house rules on invis because of this mess.

[Tharkun]

Maybe get bumped down to level 6-7.
I forgot that it can be selective with its offensive properties.

I would still prefer Wall of Thorns or Force to it and reserve the 9th level slot for something more amazing.

Prismatic Wall is good at level 9 for alan patrick modules. Or anything where you have to get a lot of value from your level 9 cast. The selective nature of it is key. Get your party to have fun with it.

[Blood of Gaea]

Maybe get bumped down to level 6-7.
I forgot that it can be selective with its offensive properties.

I would still prefer Wall of Thorns or Force to it and reserve the 9th level slot for something more amazing.
I really can't agree with making it a lower level spell. It deals a variety of damages and effects without concentration, and on top of that, it's completely unreasonable for most groups of casters to get rid of one, let alone a single casting enemy.

It can also notable be used inside of an antimagic field.

Nevermind that it turns a good grapple build into an engine of destruction.

I'm not going to argue that it's one of the top 3 9th level spells, but it's still quite good and a very respectable choice.

[Chaosmancer]

50% of the party are probably ranged, but one of them (the wizard/sorcerer/bard/etc) is probably significantly worse at ranged damage than the other (rogue/ranger/ranged fighter/EB warlock/whatever), while 50% of the party are probably melee but one of them (the strength-based fighter/paladin/barbarian/melee warlock etc) is also probably far better at dealing melee damage than the other (cleric/melee artificer/druid/monk etc).

so basically, we're trading bad ranged damage for good melee damage. the trade is actually effecient that the wizard doing 0 damage this turn in exchange for the melee damage character doing full damage is actually slightly better than the wizard casting a damage spell of the same level as jump, even when the melee damage character isn't a specialized damage build (no polearm mastery, for example). (as for scorching ray, that spell is terrible at level 5. you're giving up one of your big guns to make your damage slightly better than a non-damage-oriented character's at-will damage. at level 10 or something the resource cost is less, but the value of your 6d6 damage has gone down significantly).

So now we have to get more specific, add feats and such to the Paladin? Maybe the wizard has a Wand of Fireballs and can cast that instead of Jump.

The point is that it isn't an automatic choice. Giving up an action is a big deal. Sure, maybe the wizard sucks and has nothing useful to contribute except moving the paladin. Maybe they do something to make the other ranged character even better.




1) in the middle of combat? have fun crawling across your rope (which may have missed) while the enemies cut it.

2) since when? I can make full attacks in the middle of my movement, and jumping is just movement. and it isn't a fall, it's a jump. the DM can be a **** to anyone, but I don't see the point in assuming that your DM is out to get you.

3) I'm not even sure what your point is here. but the value of allowing someone else to contribute in full (thus making the whole group more effective overall) can certainly be significant. if you wanted to do damage yourself, why are you a spellcaster in the first place?

4) that is literally what this thread is about. what are the *most* underpowered or *most* overpowered spells. stuff that is a little below where it should be need not apply, just as stuff that is a little above where it should be need not apply. a caster could take jump and find useful ways to use the spell. they aren't necessarily absolutely 100% the best. but they're not terrible either.

1) Why are you trying to traverse a chasm in the middle of combat? Finish the fight, then get across. Or are we in a featureless plain, except for a massive chasm, and there are enemies on the other side that we absolutely need our paladin to get over and melee to death? Seems... hyper specific.

2) Since that is the ruling literally every DM I have ever played with has given every single time someone has jumped up or down to hit an enemy.

3) Because they thought AOE damage was cool. Are you going to argue that only melee characters can be damage dealers?

4) Fine, Weird is the worst spell ever. Ninth level spell canceled by a second level spell. Thread over.





so, by the math, using a level 1 jump spell adds just as much damage (well, very slightly more, but I'm not going to quibble over half a hit point worth of damage) as using a level 1 damage spell, assuming the paladin doesn't have any magic items, doesn't have any damage-boosting feats, and is not using one of the higher-damage weapons available to them, plus could potentially be useful in other places, and will continue to get further ahead as levels increase and the paladin's damage increases with it, and also assuming the jump is only needed a single time in the entire combat. not sure how you get "dead wrong" from that.

and again, here you go comparing jump to a level 2 spell and saying "look, it's worse than a level 2 spell, that must mean it's terrible". that doesn't make any sense at all. jump is a level 1 spell, the rational comparison is to look at other level 1 spells and see how it is doing.

Got that from " 3d8 damage is probably less than the difference between the paladin throwing a javelin vs the paladin being able to jump over the difficult terrain."

It isn't less. Equal at worst and when I mentioned the other spells you said "frankly, most of those options don't even sound much better than "just go somewhere and hide so you don't lose your concentration"." Which, they aren't, Scorching Ray has an obvious potential to add a solid amount of damage.

But it doesn't matter. Weird is the worst spell.





again: if you didn't want to play support to, what are you doing playing a wizard in the first place? if making the party more effective with your spells by supporting allies and disabling enemies is not what you wanted to do, why did you choose the class that is amazing at doing that and mediocre at doing the damage you seem to want to do? build an archer fighter, or a warlock, or some other damage build. something that does comparable damage to your resource-expending wizard, except without the need to expend resources so that you never need to worry about whether it's worth the resource expenditure.

that said: if "[j]ump is a great spell for Paladins to have on their spell list", then how is it even *remotely* fit to be described as one of the most underpowered spells in the game?

So, you seem to be highly judgemental of the fact that the wizard might want to do damage, instead of casting Jump. Maybe they wanted to play an evoker, is that wrong? Or maybe they want to use their spells debuffing the enemy. Or maybe they'd prefer to use Faerie Fire to buff their allies instead of holding on to jump on the off-chance someone will need to leap over a chasm in a featureless plain.

And I can say it is one of the most underpowered spells, because it seems the only one who wants it is the paladin. Fighter or Ranger? They can use all of their abilities with a ranged weapon. Warlock? They have ranged options.

The only spellcaster who seems like they ever need to jump is the Paladin. And, since they could choose to prepare the spell or not, it wouldn't even clog them up when they don't need it... which would be the vast majority of the time.





again, level 2 spell vs level 1 spell. this is not a rational basis for comparison. yes, web is probably more valuable in a sufficiently challenging fight that requires it. no, it is not reasonable to compare a level 2 spell to a level 1 spell and conclude that the level 1 spell is bad as a result of being worse than the level 2 spell. we could make a conclusion like that the other way round; for example, acid arrow being worse than chromatic orb in a level 2 spell slot, when chromatic orb has extra utility and acid arrow doesn't, is a reasonable argument that acid arrow is a terrible spell (though acid arrow does have a tiny upside in that a miss still does a tiny bit of damage, I'm not remotely convinced that's enough to salvage anything).

Sure, but the only reason the Paladin needs to Jump is because of their level 5 Extra attack. Remember that math I did above, where the paladin did that 21 average damage?

Before level five that is 1d8+6 or 10.5 damage. Throwing a Javelin is 1d6+4 or 7.5. Meaning the Wizard at levels 1 through 4 is casting Jump to gain 3 damamge for the party. And how much was Chromatic Orb again? Oh yeah. 13.5. Heck, Firebolt is 5.5 which is adding more damage than casting Jump.

Meaning the only time Jump because a viable combat option is after level 5, when you have second and third level spells that you are giving up.

And sure, a Variant Human Vengeance Paladin with Polearm master and yadda yadda yadda is going to be soo much better in melee, but the more specific we have to get, the less useful the spell is, because the value is only really coming online when those conditions are met.





DMs have ignored the rules that are in the book to make up bad rules is still not a reasonable basis for comparison. we have official rules. those make a reasonable basis for comparison because everyone has equal access to them; I can look them up, you can look them up, everyone else can look them up, and we're all starting from the same point. your DM's crappy house rules are only available to your DM's table. I can't look them up, quite frankly you probably can't even look them up until they get dumped on you in the middle of a session, and nobody else out there can look them up. they may exist, but there is no way for me or anyone else who doesn't play at your table to use them to rate the value of *anything* because they may as well not exist as far as anyone else is concerned.

as for why you might need jump: same reason you sometimes want spider climb: it doesn't slow you down. moving at full speed instead of half (or 1/4, in the case of spells like plant growth or transmute rock to mud, or not at all in the case of spells that immobilize you, or while avoiding damage in case of spells like spike growth) is a great benefit when time pressures are a concern. for example, in the middle of pitched combat. being able to do that at a low resource cost (level 1 spell and most importantly no concentration) is a handy ability to have.


Look dude, I don't care that you don't care about those DM rules. I didn't add that the person using Spider Climb was pounding in pitons for you. I added that for the person who was going to tell me that no one can follow the guy using Spider Climb, therefore it wasn't doing anything. That was it. Get bent out of shape over it as much as you want, it didn't change my overall point.

And again, pitched combat, giving up your action which could be doing a whole host of other things, in the middle of combat to avoid enemy difficult terrain. While you can already jump at least between 16 and 18 ft as a strength melee fighter anyways. Maybe further if you roll an athletics check. So, possibly as far as... 20 ft. Which is the radius of quite a few of those spell.

[Meichrob7]

Pretty damn sure, it’s an underpowered mess. But hey, I’ll happily hear any argument to the contrary.

I mean I’ve always viewed it as “Ranger help action for attacks” and from that perspective it’s something worth taking with certain allies, specifically paladins and hexblade warlocks.

It’s certainly niche and under powered, but it’s by no means as useless as people think.

[micahaphone]

Mislead doesn't actually work. It was obviously written before they fully defined how invisibility and hide works.

I have a whole bunch of house rules on invis because of this mess.

You just made me realize I've been houseruling / RAI -ing for Mislead.

I know the RAW for invisibility and usually apply it. I don't know why I didn't connect the two in my head.

[SharkForce]

- no, you don't have to add feats to the paladin. but if you do, the situation looks even worse for casting chromatic orb. and sure, the wizard could have other options, like casting more powerful level 2 or 3 spells. but those often cost concentration which jump doesn't, they only work once which is not the case with jump, and again, when you compare a level 1 spell to jump, jump comes out looking fine.

1) you traverse a chasm (or other obstacle) because you need to be on the other side of it. sometimes stuff gets in your way.

2) find a DM that doesn't hate melee characters having fun like everyone else gets to do.

3) what, the famous AoE chromatic orb? that said... wizards can be less bad at damage dealing if they're exclusively aiming for AoE. but this is not a system that favours damage on spellcasters. you hit a peak at level 5 with fireball where it is not terrible, and then rapidly proceed to get further and further away from damage, even AoE damage, being a great way to spend your action. when you look at the strongest wizard spells, what do you see people talking about? do you see a lot of people who think meteor swarm, or wish? mass suggestion, or disintegrate? wall of fire, or wall of force? if you want to be an AoE nuke blaster, this is a *terrible* system to try and do that in. you simply do not have the spell slots to sustain damage.

4) also a bunch of other spells that suck far far more than jump could over hope to suck.

- you did the math. you tell me: which is less, 20.5, or 21? as for scorching ray, 21 damage. that's... decent? I mean, you've managed to keep up with a paladin who's phoning it in on the damage (no smites, no damage-boosting feats, using a one-handed weapon and a shield) for a single round, by spending one of your better spell slots. if that isn't enough to tell you that this game does not favour the role you've chosen on the class you've chosen, I'm not sure what is enough.

- I mean, it isn't *specifically* jump. you have a class that is absolutely amazing, frequently argued to be the best in the game, at providing crowd controls and buffs, and that is frankly crap at doing sustained damage of any kind. if you hate the idea of providing crowd control and buffs, and you love the idea of doing damage, then why for the love of all that is holy are you playing a class that is amazing at the thing you hate and terrible at the thing you love? also jump is not on the paladin spell list. they want you to cast it because you *can* cast it, and they can't. and no, the paladin is not the only one who wants it. any primarily melee character can make good use of it. even some ranged characters can make use of it, to get into better positions to attack from or to get to places where their enemies will struggle to reach.

- jump not being worthwhile before level 5 does not make it bad. it makes it something you wait to use until you're higher level and it provides a nice benefit at a low cost, allowing you to save your higher level spell slots and concentration for something better than pretending you're a fighter for a single round. just like sleep is not a bad spell when it becomes less and less valuable over time and your enemy HP scales far faster than sleep. it just needs to be good at some point in time to be good.

- my problem isn't spider climb. my problem is that you keep on pulling out level 2 or higher spells and saying "look, this is better than jump, that means jump is absolute garbage that nobody should ever use". well, no crap they're better. they're a higher level spell. that is not a reasonable comparison. I could pull out a level 2 paladin and compare them to a level 1 fighter and say "look, the fighter only gets a fighting style and a tiny heal, but the paladin gets a fighting style, a much more versatile heal, spellcasting, and smites, plus twice as many hit points", and I would have to hope you'd be able to look at that and recognize that the conclusion is not valid because the statements supporting it may be true, but they are not valid. I am not making a fair comparison there, and neither are you when you have this expectation that in order for a level 1 spell to not be absolute garbage it must be better than a level 2 spell.

[Valmark]

You just made me realize I've been houseruling / RAI -ing for Mislead.

I know the RAW for invisibility and usually apply it. I don't know why I didn't connect the two in my head.

Why Mislead doesn't work? As far as I can tell it's Invisibility plus that whole stuff about illusions.

[MaxWilson]

Why Mislead doesn't work? As far as I can tell it's Invisibility plus that whole stuff about illusions.

The issue is that unless you Hide after casting it (either as a bonus action if you're e.g. a goblin wizard, or on a subsequent round), you're invisible but not Hidden.

[Valmark]

The issue is that unless you Hide after casting it (either as a bonus action if you're e.g. a goblin wizard, or on a subsequent round), you're invisible but not Hidden.

Oh I see, it's not that it doesn't work as much as it's not going to hide you (from how they talked about it I thought there was some weird interaction I didn't know about).

[Jerrykhor]

The issue is that unless you Hide after casting it (either as a bonus action if you're e.g. a goblin wizard, or on a subsequent round), you're invisible but not Hidden.

It has a 1 hour duration, presumably you should use it out of sight of people you are trying to fool.

[MaxWilson]

It has a 1 hour duration, presumably you should use it out of sight of people you are trying to fool.

Well, I mean, maybe--but in other versions of (A)D&D the whole point of Mislead has typically been that you can cast it right in front of your victims and then walk away while your double continues to converse with them. It's a classic Bad Guy spell.

It's too bad if the 5E version isn't usable for that.

[micahaphone]

It has a 1 hour duration, presumably you should use it out of sight of people you are trying to fool.

The "instantly create an illusory clone" part really makes it seem like it's an amazing "oh crap" button to hit if you're suddenly caught doing something you shouldn't or other shenanigans, so that's part of the disappointment.


-----
A recent reddit post made me realize how much I dislike Scatter. It's a 6th level spell that has a chance of teleporting enemies away from you. I feel like there's a slew of other teleporting or CC spells that I can think of that would fulfill a similar task. Like, you need to be out of melee but can't leave your place at the altar, or you're protecting a whole gaggle of orphans and can't Dimension Door all of them away or something.
But it's the same slot as a Chain Lightning or Mass Suggestion, and wow does spending that slot for a chance to move enemies away from you feel underwhelming.

I have similar feelings about Compulsion, but at least that spell creates opportunity attacks and could get multiple uses out of the spell over its duration.

[Valmark]

Well, I mean, maybe--but in other versions of (A)D&D the whole point of Mislead has typically been that you can cast it right in front of your victims and then walk away while your double continues to converse with them. It's a classic Bad Guy spell.

I mean, dependant on the DM but moving silently (i.e. Stealth check) after casting Mislead would work perfectly fine for this.

Though I would still find it underpowered on the basis that it's level 5. I'd have pinned it as either level 4 or 3, probably with more text regarding how the illusion works.

[ff7hero]

I mean, dependant on the DM but moving silently (i.e. Stealth check) after casting Mislead would work perfectly fine for this.


So...the Hide action?

[MaxWilson]

I feel like there's a slew of other teleporting or CC spells that I can think of that would fulfill a similar task. Like, you need to be out of melee but can't leave your place at the altar *snip*

It took me a while to realize that you weren't talking about a wizard being attacked in the middle of his or her own wedding, and having to fight off the bad guys while still finishing the ceremony and getting hitched. :)


So...the Hide action?

One of the 5E's great sins is that it defines its rules in terms of game jargon, often without connecting them to anything tangible in the game world. What happens when you successfully "make a Dex save" against Fireball, and why doesn't it change your position or make you go prone? What exactly is "the Hide action" if you take it while invisible, and without moving? Mislead exposes this problem as a gameplay issue but the roots lie deeper.

[Valmark]

So...the Hide action?

Up to the DM. I've met more then one that ruled that Hiding required you to stay still while moving silently was another thing (that still uses Stealth). I think the book heavily implies that hiding also includes moving silently, but whatever.

Also out of combat that would be a non-issue (since you aren't limited to the round's structure) so there's that at least. Still not preparing it.

Speaking of potentially underpowered spells, what do you people think of Leomund's Secret Chest? (Or whatever was the name).

[Jerrykhor]

One of the 5E's great sins is that it defines its rules in terms of game jargon, often without connecting them to anything tangible in the game world. What happens when you successfully "make a Dex save" against Fireball, and why doesn't it change your position or make you go prone? What exactly is "the Hide action" if you take it while invisible, and without moving? Mislead exposes this problem as a gameplay issue but the roots lie deeper.

One thing that i find amusing is trying to imagine what happens to my mount when it is subjected to Fireball, with the Mounted Combatant's 3rd bullet point effect. It essentially grants the mount Evasion, which means it is a pro at dodging Fireballs, but only when I'm mounted on it. Like, how?? I still can't picture it.

[noob]

One thing that i find amusing is trying to imagine what happens to my mount when it is subjected to Fireball, with the Mounted Combatant's 3rd bullet point effect. It essentially grants the mount Evasion, which means it is a pro at dodging Fireballs, but only when I'm mounted on it. Like, how?? I still can't picture it.

You grab your mount and throw it away from the explosion then after you took the entire fireball with your face you jump back on your mount?

[Galithar]

One thing that i find amusing is trying to imagine what happens to my mount when it is subjected to Fireball, with the Mounted Combatant's 3rd bullet point effect. It essentially grants the mount Evasion, which means it is a pro at dodging Fireballs, but only when I'm mounted on it. Like, how?? I still can't picture it.

Obviously when you're sitting on top of the mount you can kick your legs really fast to keep the fire away!

[Asisreo1]

Obviously when you're sitting on top of the mount you can kick your legs really fast to keep the fire away!
Well now I'm imagining a rogue kick-flipping a horse through a fireball explosion with sunglasses in a medieval setting and I think I know the tone of my next campaign.

[Willie the Duck]

One thing that i find amusing is trying to imagine what happens to my mount when it is subjected to Fireball, with the Mounted Combatant's 3rd bullet point effect. It essentially grants the mount Evasion, which means it is a pro at dodging Fireballs, but only when I'm mounted on it. Like, how?? I still can't picture it.

I've always read all of the 'mounted feats let you help your mount dodge' abilities (and I recall 3e having them as well) as being roughly 'you are really good at guiding your mount away from/around the spear points and pitfalls of the battlefield.'

[JackPhoenix]

Well, I mean, maybe--but in other versions of (A)D&D the whole point of Mislead has typically been that you can cast it right in front of your victims and then walk away while your double continues to converse with them. It's a classic Bad Guy spell.

It's too bad if the 5E version isn't usable for that.

Being invisible but not hidden means the enemy knows where you are... which is exactly where the illusion is, as if nothing happened, at least until you can Hide on your next turn. It may not work that well in combat, but it works for the mentioned use, unless you need to walk away *now* and not 6 seconds later.

You can also sent the illusion in your stead and never be there in the first place.

[Chaosmancer]

- no, you don't have to add feats to the paladin. but if you do, the situation looks even worse for casting chromatic orb. and sure, the wizard could have other options, like casting more powerful level 2 or 3 spells. but those often cost concentration which jump doesn't, they only work once which is not the case with jump, and again, when you compare a level 1 spell to jump, jump comes out looking fine.

1) you traverse a chasm (or other obstacle) because you need to be on the other side of it. sometimes stuff gets in your way.

2) find a DM that doesn't hate melee characters having fun like everyone else gets to do.

3) what, the famous AoE chromatic orb? that said... wizards can be less bad at damage dealing if they're exclusively aiming for AoE. but this is not a system that favours damage on spellcasters. you hit a peak at level 5 with fireball where it is not terrible, and then rapidly proceed to get further and further away from damage, even AoE damage, being a great way to spend your action. when you look at the strongest wizard spells, what do you see people talking about? do you see a lot of people who think meteor swarm, or wish? mass suggestion, or disintegrate? wall of fire, or wall of force? if you want to be an AoE nuke blaster, this is a *terrible* system to try and do that in. you simply do not have the spell slots to sustain damage.

4) also a bunch of other spells that suck far far more than jump could over hope to suck.

- you did the math. you tell me: which is less, 20.5, or 21? as for scorching ray, 21 damage. that's... decent? I mean, you've managed to keep up with a paladin who's phoning it in on the damage (no smites, no damage-boosting feats, using a one-handed weapon and a shield) for a single round, by spending one of your better spell slots. if that isn't enough to tell you that this game does not favour the role you've chosen on the class you've chosen, I'm not sure what is enough.

- I mean, it isn't *specifically* jump. you have a class that is absolutely amazing, frequently argued to be the best in the game, at providing crowd controls and buffs, and that is frankly crap at doing sustained damage of any kind. if you hate the idea of providing crowd control and buffs, and you love the idea of doing damage, then why for the love of all that is holy are you playing a class that is amazing at the thing you hate and terrible at the thing you love? also jump is not on the paladin spell list. they want you to cast it because you *can* cast it, and they can't. and no, the paladin is not the only one who wants it. any primarily melee character can make good use of it. even some ranged characters can make use of it, to get into better positions to attack from or to get to places where their enemies will struggle to reach.

So, a summary of the points so far:

1) Things might happen while traveling so Jump is better

2) Find DMs who agree with me

3) Wizards shouldn't do damage, so they should only buff and debuff, nothing else

4) There are other things worse than Jump.


None of this is anything even worth arguing about on this thread.




- jump not being worthwhile before level 5 does not make it bad. it makes it something you wait to use until you're higher level and it provides a nice benefit at a low cost, allowing you to save your higher level spell slots and concentration for something better than pretending you're a fighter for a single round. just like sleep is not a bad spell when it becomes less and less valuable over time and your enemy HP scales far faster than sleep. it just needs to be good at some point in time to be good.

- my problem isn't spider climb. my problem is that you keep on pulling out level 2 or higher spells and saying "look, this is better than jump, that means jump is absolute garbage that nobody should ever use". well, no crap they're better. they're a higher level spell. that is not a reasonable comparison. I could pull out a level 2 paladin and compare them to a level 1 fighter and say "look, the fighter only gets a fighting style and a tiny heal, but the paladin gets a fighting style, a much more versatile heal, spellcasting, and smites, plus twice as many hit points", and I would have to hope you'd be able to look at that and recognize that the conclusion is not valid because the statements supporting it may be true, but they are not valid. I am not making a fair comparison there, and neither are you when you have this expectation that in order for a level 1 spell to not be absolute garbage it must be better than a level 2 spell.


Here is something at least worth discussing.

See, we both agree that Jump is not worth using before level 5. That means it is hard to justify taking at levels 1 and 2. Which means if you want it later, you have to learn it instead of a 2nd or 3rd level spell. Which means you have to give up a much more powerful spell.

Unless the DM gives you a scroll or spellbook that has Jump in it.

However, by level five, it is reasonable to assume the party has a few uncommon magic items, and a scroll or spellbook containing Jump that the wizard can copy would be treasure just like say, A Ring of Jumping which would allow the Paladin to cast Jump on himself as a Bonus Action. Or the Boots of Striding and Springing which just give you the effect of Jump with no action.


So, taken as a whole, this is why I keep pointing out that a 2nd level spell is doing the same work. Not because I want to directly compare a second level spell and a first level spell, but the soonest that first level spell becomes actually viable is by 5th level, but SPider Climb is a spell that has a variety of uses even at 3rd level. Meaning I might have taken it anyways. Which means when I ht level 5, or am asking for treasure, I might already have Spider Climb prepped and ready to go, which cuts off some of the options that would make Jump worthwhile. But I don't have Jump yet. Because it wasn't worth taking before this point.

And, would the wizard even ask for it? Is getting the Jump spell on their wish list so they can buff the Paladin? Or is it far more likely the Paladin is going to be asking for items to increase their mobility?



And again, if your entire argument is just that Jump is not the worst spell in the game, I will grant you that. But it is not a good spell.


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------




A recent reddit post made me realize how much I dislike Scatter. It's a 6th level spell that has a chance of teleporting enemies away from you. I feel like there's a slew of other teleporting or CC spells that I can think of that would fulfill a similar task. Like, you need to be out of melee but can't leave your place at the altar, or you're protecting a whole gaggle of orphans and can't Dimension Door all of them away or something.
But it's the same slot as a Chain Lightning or Mass Suggestion, and wow does spending that slot for a chance to move enemies away from you feel underwhelming.

I have similar feelings about Compulsion, but at least that spell creates opportunity attacks and could get multiple uses out of the spell over its duration.


I'm not sure what you are talking about with Scatter. You teleport five creatures, each one to an unoccupied space you can see within 120 ft of you.

You can send enemies away, send allies in, this is literally a "reposition five people" spell. I don't get how it could be bad. I mean, yes, if your goal is to use it to move enemies away, and they make their saves, that isn't good. But you can also move the fighter next to some weak enemies and move yourself and other squishies away, no save needed because you are all willing.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------





Speaking of potentially underpowered spells, what do you people think of Leomund's Secret Chest? (Or whatever was the name).


Plot spell. It is basically extra storage capacity in a place most people can't reach it. Highly expensive, but also a chance of losing the chest or beings in the Ethereal stealing it. I'd probably never take it, but it has uses in plot or if you are dealing with things you absolutely can't have on your person.

[Gignere]

Plot spell. It is basically extra storage capacity in a place most people can't reach it. Highly expensive, but also a chance of losing the chest or beings in the Ethereal stealing it. I'd probably never take it, but it has uses in plot or if you are dealing with things you absolutely can't have on your person.

You can technically combo it with glyph of warding. Store your glyphs in the chest and summon the chest where you are fighting and get concentration free buffs. Although your DM may rule that taking it out of the Ethereal Plane is moving it more than 10 feet.

With that caveat if it works Secret Chest is a fantastic spell and receptacle for Glyph of Warding.

[KorvinStarmast]

Bless
Maybe it's not overpowered, but I think it might be the most under rated. It's a never ending source of joy in my party when I play a cleric. Particularly the boost to saving throws.

Pass Without Trace
You've just turned your party into a bunch of assassins. At the cost of a second level spell slot. It's a nice spell for a number of situations, but not OP.
Because Jump IS trash. Its only effective if you have decent Strength to begin with. The typical caster that has 8 strength can high jump 2ft without Jump, and 6 ft with it. If you have 20 strength, you can jump 8ft without and 24 ft with it.
Ranger gets jump at level 2. Your position is quite narrowly defined. We used it during exploration quite a bit in Tier 1 play.

Why are you trying to cross the chasm before killing the goblin? Time pressure is a thing in some adventures.
Basically, it's strong under certain circumstances, but I'm not sure how strong. It's certainly much stronger in white-room, schrodinger's encounter scenarios. It's best IME indoors/hallways/dungeons such that an enemy gets trapped.

Exploration, primarily. The Jump spell + a good STR score + lots of rope means the party does not need to resort to Levitation or Fly spells. We found that also.
I love your idea on Earthquake + Sharn. :smallbiggrin:

You should try playing in a game with Wall of Force where you have an ally caster who drops a damage over time effect prior to your casting of Wall of For e before the enemy has time to react and see if that changes your opinion of the spell.
We hope to do that at ninth level when my brother can DM again. (RL has him on pause at the moment). Our wizard will have it, I have Sickening Radiance with my Celestial 'Lock. But that's a situational thing.

Jump is niche, but it does deliver on what the spell promises..namely, jumping. Yes. Even sillier is a high level monk with Belt of Hill Giant Strength and ring of jumping. :smallbiggrin: Boing Boing Boing. (We messed arund with that during a high level one shot: good, clean, silly fun. (A remark overheard more than once "what's he doing back there?" as regards my monk leaping over the fray to get at enemy casters ...

jump, I actually think is decent in the right terrain. it isn't a self-only spell. you can put it on an ally and they have one minute of concentration-free enhanced jumping. Yep. Our at table experience agrees with you.

The problem with Jump is, its not so unique that there are problems that only Jump can solve. That's a very narrow criterion.
By the way, Misty Step is a second level spell. Jump is first level.

Jump invocation requires level 9 in lock I think. Which is IMO a dumb thing. It ought to be, like the Detect Magic invocation, available at level 2. (Might change a few Pact of the Blade builds ...)

[micahaphone]

I'm not sure what you are talking about with Scatter. You teleport five creatures, each one to an unoccupied space you can see within 120 ft of you.

You can send enemies away, send allies in, this is literally a "reposition five people" spell. I don't get how it could be bad. I mean, yes, if your goal is to use it to move enemies away, and they make their saves, that isn't good. But you can also move the fighter next to some weak enemies and move yourself and other squishies away, no save needed because you are all willing.


I hadn't thought about moving allies around, especially that willing creatures can skip the saving throw, but I'm still skeptical that it's worth a 6th level slot. In combat it's very situational for if your whole party gets caught out in a trap/ambush, you can quickly rearrange.
Like my previous post, teleporting yourself is usually better than teleporting the enemies around you, unless there's a situational reason that you can't leave. I'd like it for teleporting the enemy squishies into the front and their bruisers to the back, but the spell has a range of 30 feet, so you can't even try for that.
I agree it can be used (it's no Find Traps) but for a 6th level slot I feel it's far too situational and the usual save-or-suck problem of "if they save, you just blew a 6th level slot for nothing". If it could reach targets farther away for more offensive swaps I'd be a bit more interested in it.

Out of combat, it's the same spell slot (and available to the same classes) as Arcane Gate, which has a much better range and can transport many more people than Scatter.

[MaxWilson]

Being invisible but not hidden means the enemy knows where you are... which is exactly where the illusion is, as if nothing happened, at least until you can Hide on your next turn. It may not work that well in combat, but it works for the mentioned use, unless you need to walk away *now* and not 6 seconds later.

Yes, I agree, as I said before in post #160.

But there's still an unfortunate gap where you need to make your image stop moving and talking for six seconds because you are spending your action to Hide instead of manipulate the image, and so it's too bad making the image move/act isn't a bonus action instead.

[Thunderous Mojo]

Well, I mean, maybe--but in other versions of (A)D&D the whole point of Mislead has typically been that you can cast it right in front of your victims and then walk away while your double continues to converse with them. It's a classic Bad Guy spell.

It's too bad if the 5E version isn't usable for that.

Mislead was only an Illusionist class spell in AD&D, but it did grant Improved Invisibility!

I can't recall a single instance where Mislead, was ever used in a game by a player.

Having the 5e version of Mislead grant Greater Invisibility for an hour, would probably be too much of a correction.
Allowing the spell to automatically have the caster count as Hidden, is the tweak the spell needs.

(It is really all the Invisible condition needs, frankly)

I have a Cleric of Trickery with the Eberron Mark of Shadow, so eventually I will get access to the spell, and plan on using it.

There is no range limitation on the spell!
SG-1's Remote Drone...now in D&D...

The only thing misleading about the spell is the name. The spell creates a great magical scout, perfect for exploration while the group takes a Short Rest.

(Hopefully, it will meet my expectations)



One of the 5E's great sins is that it defines its rules in terms of game jargon, often without connecting them to anything tangible in the game world. What happens when you successfully "make a Dex save" against Fireball, and why doesn't it change your position or make you go prone? What exactly is "the Hide action" if you take it while invisible, and without moving? Mislead exposes this problem as a gameplay issue but the roots lie deeper.

I have a mixed emotional reaction to this. On one level I absolutely wish more narrative gameplay examples were given.

At the same time, nothing produced by the current D&D design team, has indicated that they could manage the creativity and clarity of description and explanation, required to successfully accomplish this.

[micahaphone]

I have a mixed emotional reaction to this. On one level I absolutely wish more narrative gameplay examples were given.

At the same time, nothing produced by the current D&D design team, has indicated that they could manage the creativity and clarity of description and explanation, required to successfully accomplish this.

"The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the course of action sound reasonable."
"you might suggest that a knight give her warhorse to the first beggar she meets."
Jeez, imagine if they gave an example of how to word your suggestion to sound reasonable.

[ff7hero]

One of the 5E's great sins is that it defines its rules in terms of game jargon, often without connecting them to anything tangible in the game world. What happens when you successfully "make a Dex save" against Fireball, and why doesn't it change your position or make you go prone? What exactly is "the Hide action" if you take it while invisible, and without moving? Mislead exposes this problem as a gameplay issue but the roots lie deeper.

I agree that 5e is guilty of this, but it's hardly a new problem. Fireball has worked almost exactly the same way as it works now (including the existence of Evasion) since at least 3e.

The Hide action, as I interpret the various rules about invisibility and the like, is more about taking time to move/act slowly/quietly. If it wasn't for Cunning Action's BA Hide, I probably wouldn't care about it as much, but I see so many people stealth nerfing (pun not intended but acknowledged) the Rogue.

[LordCdrMilitant]

For overpowered spells, I'm going to go with:

Wish - This shouldn't exist. Seriously, I get that it's legacy, but any spell that's a blank check like this to do anything is bad. It completely skews the high level spell balance too.
Simulacrum - It would be fine if it was an alternate active body to control or something, but it doubles everything about you and works on its own. It's like wizardly grey goo. The concept is bad, the execution is.
Clone - Why bother having an immortality spell? Like, is it that necessary that this exist?
Knock - This spell is designed to trivialize other classes without collectively contributing something to the party. It doesn't even comply with the idea that every class can cross a door, but how you do it is different. Instead, it's like everything you can do I do better
Tongues - Why both with languages or language feats at all. Nobody cares anyway, but this just kind of cements that.
Healing Word - Yoyo ho!
Animate Objects - this could be fine, except for the horde of coins.


For underpowered
True Strike - Literally worse than not doing it and just doing what you were going to do next turn
Counterspell - basically defunct, and before then it was still largely less efficient than using that 3'rd level slot offensively. It would be good if it could "trade up" and hit higher level spells, but like you only get a tiny bit of tempo advantage and that's even if you get a chance to use it.
Haste - It really should give the target their full set of attacks. I get that it comes with ancillary benefits of hightened move and AC, and when it comes online it's okay, but it scales so poorly and of all the utility buffs has like the least supportiveness and synchronity with your target's abilities. There will rarely be a case where you're better off hasting the fighter than shooting a cantrip, and cantrips are hilariously weak anyway.
Basically most damage spells. Most damage spells are similar to others except with a different blast pattern and different number of dice rolled. This inevitably means that with the sole exception of resistances which are uncommon and not worth deliberately picking a spell to worry about, there will always be one spell in each level that's just better than the others because it rolls more dice or hits a weaker save, making the remaining damage spells without bonus effects redundant.
Most debuff spells. These don't save for half like damage spells, so it's literally just a waste of your spells slot, since most enemies at your level will negate it more than half the time. Remember, spell save DC's are. For parity opposition, remember, the defender has a 2 point advantage over the caster when it comes to effect.





Personally, I like spells that have effects that aren't directly based on dealing or healing damage. Support spells, like haste, invisibility, or teleport that can affect probabilities, action economy etc. are the spells I'd like to see more of. Some of them are always useful, like teleportation effects, because the effect itself doesn't get outscaled, but some like haste are very quickly outscaled. I'd like to see more emphasis on these kinds of spells that are force multipliers on other party members [and will almost always be more powerful to put on someone other than the caster], to play into a supportive caster versus another competition for damage dealer.
I think there could definitely stand to be fewer damage dealing spells in the game because some will always be redundant. In addition, their relative scaling is bad particularly with the way spell level, spell slot availability, and spell damage work this edition. I'd like to see effects scale with caster level instead of spell level to keep low level spells worthwhile and to address the fact that at least to me, I feel weaker as a caster at high levels than I do at mid levels. I feel like because of the combined effect of low level slots just being worthless at high levels and the lower availability of high level slots [coupled with the fact that a lot of high level spells are honestly just underwhelming and unexciting], a caster's power curve relative to other players goes up, peaks around the time 4-6th level spells are your top spells, and then down again, while a fighter follows an always ascending step function.



Were I to change the spells I listed, I would change them to:
Wish - delete [or limit to the "cast another lower level spell" effect]
Simulacrum - As an action, you have control of it, and can cast and attack from it, but you cast from it using your spell slots.
Clone - delete
Knock - delete
Tongues - delete
Healing Word - delete, we already have cure wound, this spell is literally to facilitate yoyo healing without interruption to your action economy
Animate Objects - animate only a single object no matter what, or maybe have small animated objects count as a swarm instead of 10 separate critters.

True Strike - Chose any creature within range 30', that creature gains advantage on its next attack roll until the end of its next turn. At levels 5, 11, and 20 it gains advantage on its next 2, 3, or 4 attack rolls until the end of it's next turn.
Counterspell - any spell is counterspelled by counterspell without a check, and you know what spells are being cast. Also have it counter non-spell magical abilities.
Haste - target may make all their attacks when they take the attack action with it.

[MaxWilson]

I agree that 5e is guilty of this, but it's hardly a new problem. Fireball has worked almost exactly the same way as it works now (including the existence of Evasion) since at least 3e.

Exactly, it's a WotC thing. Magic: the Gathering is deep in its corporate DNA.


The Hide action, as I interpret the various rules about invisibility and the like, is more about taking time to move/act slowly/quietly. If it wasn't for Cunning Action's BA Hide, I probably wouldn't care about it as much, but I see so many people stealth nerfing (pun not intended but acknowledged) the Rogue.

What about freezing in place and doing absolutely nothing while you use your action to control your illusion from Mislead, to make it lead people away from your location? Would you grant a freebie Stealth attempt in that case to avoid letting the invisible mage be detected, or would you still insist on the need for a separate Hide action?

[ff7hero]

What about freezing in place and doing absolutely nothing while you use your action to control your illusion from Mislead, to make it lead people away from your location? Would you grant a freebie Stealth attempt in that case to avoid letting the invisible mage be detected, or would you still insist on the need for a separate Hide action?

The latter. If you want a narrative justification, the act of controlling the illusion is too strenuous to perform while also keeping your breathing quiet. A Rogue or Goblin wizard could do it thanks to their training or racial aptitude for stealth.

To be clear, all Hiding would get them is the enemy wouldn't know what space they occupy. I know it nerfs Mislead (and Invisibility generally), but I think that's better than nerfing Rogues.

[Valmark]

Knock - This spell is designed to trivialize other classes without collectively contributing something to the party. It doesn't even comply with the idea that every class can cross a door, but how you do it is different. Instead, it's like everything you can do I do better

Counterspell - basically defunct, and before then it was still largely less efficient than using that 3'rd level slot offensively. It would be good if it could "trade up" and hit higher level spells, but like you only get a tiny bit of tempo advantage and that's even if you get a chance to use it.

Keep in mind that Knock is guaranteed to ruin any stealthing the group's doing- it's only good when you don't need to worry about being caught (which is dependant on the DM).

I didn't think I'd ever see someone consider Counterspell bad- between stopping hostile spellcasters from running, stopping the party from getting blasted, stopping party members from getting Plane Shifted on another plane (as in, enemy was going to Plane Shift the Fighter into the Hells) and some other situations this is a spell that has saved my groups' asses several times (only once did I know what spell was being cast and I was going to Counterspell it anyway).
Talk about different experiences.

[LordCdrMilitant]

Keep in mind that Knock is guaranteed to ruin any stealthing the group's doing- it's only good when you don't need to worry about being caught (which is dependant on the DM).

I didn't think I'd ever see someone consider Counterspell bad- between stopping hostile spellcasters from running, stopping the party from getting blasted, stopping party members from getting Plane Shifted on another plane (as in, enemy was going to Plane Shift the Fighter into the Hells) and some other situations this is a spell that has saved my groups' asses several times (only once did I know what spell was being cast and I was going to Counterspell it anyway).
Talk about different experiences.

By the rules, when you cast counterspell, you don't know what spell is being cast. This is the first part of it's badness. Somebody much spend their reaction to identify it with arcana, and then you can counterspell. [you could also just counterspell without knowing, but nothing says you didn't just use it on a firebolt]

And then, of course, you have to pass a check against it to dispell if it's higher than 3.

[MaxWilson]

The latter. If you want a narrative justification, the act of controlling the illusion is too strenuous to perform while also keeping your breathing quiet. A Rogue or Goblin wizard could do it thanks to their training or racial aptitude for stealth.

To be clear, all Hiding would get them is the enemy wouldn't know what space they occupy. I know it nerfs Mislead (and Invisibility generally), but I think that's better than nerfing Rogues.

I don't think that narrative justification works. If I spend six seconds Hiding (keeping my breathing quiet while invisibly standing beneath the illusion), I can thereafter move the illusion around without having my breathing heard when the illusion eventually leaves my space, but if I don't spend those six seconds my breathing will give me away when the illusion eventually leaves my space? That doesn't make sense. I can respect the ruling for game balance reasons but surely you must concede that narratively the justification doesn't fly. The fact that 5E puts you in this ridiculous position of having to say, "I know, but that's just how this game works!" is one of the things I hate most about 5E and why I am reluctant to run it for people new to TTRPGs. I think it teaches/reinforces bad roleplaying habits.


Keep in mind that Knock is guaranteed to ruin any stealthing the group's doing- it's only good when you don't need to worry about being caught (which is dependant on the DM).

Unless you get a Bard/Cleric/Ranger/Shadow Monk to cast Silence on the lock before someone else casts Knock on it.

[Gignere]

Unless you get a Bard/Cleric/Ranger/Shadow Monk to cast Silence on the lock before someone else casts Knock on it.

Two level 2 spells thats a lot to open a locked door.

[MaxWilson]

Two level 2 spells thats a lot to open a locked door.

You're not wrong.

Although I also have to point out that once a Shadow Monk has already cast Silence on the door, there may no longer be any reason not to simply have the same Shadow hammer the door into splinters using his fists. Knock is sometimes overkill. In fact, I haven't ever seen Knock cast outside of AD&D.

Also, if there are multiple locks you need more than one Knock spell.

[Thunderous Mojo]

Two level 2 spells thats a lot to open a locked door.

That really depends on the door, and what is behind it.

Knock and Silence to open the front gates to a town, or castle...might be absolutely worth it.

Also, touching a door might kill you.

[ff7hero]

I don't think that narrative justification works. If I spend six seconds Hiding (keeping my breathing quiet while invisibly standing beneath the illusion), I can thereafter move the illusion around without having my breathing heard when the illusion eventually leaves my space, but if I don't spend those six seconds my breathing will give me away when the illusion eventually leaves my space? That doesn't make sense. I can respect the ruling for game balance reasons but surely you must concede that narratively the justification doesn't fly. The fact that 5E puts you in this ridiculous position of having to say, "I know, but that's just how this game works!" is one of the things I hate most about 5E and why I am reluctant to run it for people new to TTRPGs. I think it teaches/reinforces bad roleplaying habits.


Fair point, I'm glad to be having this discussion. How about the Hide action representing the character carefully observing the 5 foot square they're occupying to check for things like crunchy leaves, end tables, or other similar objects?

I agree at the end of the day that the narrative gymnastics can get tiring, and there's no universal definition of what "Hiding" looks like in 5e. However I feel like it improves the game to make the distinction between unseen and hidden a bit more significant.

[Chaosmancer]

I hadn't thought about moving allies around, especially that willing creatures can skip the saving throw, but I'm still skeptical that it's worth a 6th level slot. In combat it's very situational for if your whole party gets caught out in a trap/ambush, you can quickly rearrange.
Like my previous post, teleporting yourself is usually better than teleporting the enemies around you, unless there's a situational reason that you can't leave. I'd like it for teleporting the enemy squishies into the front and their bruisers to the back, but the spell has a range of 30 feet, so you can't even try for that.
I agree it can be used (it's no Find Traps) but for a 6th level slot I feel it's far too situational and the usual save-or-suck problem of "if they save, you just blew a 6th level slot for nothing". If it could reach targets farther away for more offensive swaps I'd be a bit more interested in it.

Out of combat, it's the same spell slot (and available to the same classes) as Arcane Gate, which has a much better range and can transport many more people than Scatter.


Hmm, I had missed that the range is 30 ft. That does make it tougher to use. I agree though, maybe not worth a 6th level slot. I could see this totally wrecking an encounter, or you go big and get nothing.

Still, mid-combat it has a chance of Sending some enemy heavies far away and your allies next to their squishies. And, there is another thing. You can run into the enemies. You count as a creature you can see, so as long as you are willing to only target four enemies, you can take a lot of risky positions, then teleport yourself out.

It certainly is a combat spell though, with some exploration utility, unlike Arcane Gate which is very risky in combat since the enemies can also use the gates.


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By the rules, when you cast counterspell, you don't know what spell is being cast. This is the first part of it's badness. Somebody much spend their reaction to identify it with arcana, and then you can counterspell. [you could also just counterspell without knowing, but nothing says you didn't just use it on a firebolt]

And then, of course, you have to pass a check against it to dispell if it's higher than 3.


The reaction to use Arcana is... dumb in my opinion. I know it is controversial though, so I'm going to skate by it.

But you absolutely need to have counterspell roll for spell slots higher than it. The sheer ability to shut down any spell of any level is too much for a 3rd level slot. And it would make DMs counterspell even more, since they could shut down every single spell you ever cast, with a single mid-level enemy wizard.

As for Counterspelling monster abilities... I find that intriguing. The first things I can think of are things like the Death Knight's Hellfire orb, or a Beholder's Telekinesis. I don't think it should stop Dragon Breath though. And, I think it would have to be a DC, maybe 5+CR? I want it to be hard because for some of these monsters they only get one shot at doing this, but it would be an awesome use for Counterspell, and I think doesn't go outside what the spell is normally capable of too much,

[Asisreo1]

But you absolutely need to have counterspell roll for spell slots higher than it. The sheer ability to shut down any spell of any level is too much for a 3rd level slot. And it would make DMs counterspell even more, since they could shut down every single spell you ever cast, with a single mid-level enemy wizard.

What makes it poor is as soon as the spell is a higher level than 5, the chances of completely wasting the reaction and 3rd-level spell instantly becomes greater.

Its a straight Int-check, which means the maximum bonus is +5 but the check by-default starts at a DC14 for merely a 4th-level spell. At 5th-level, spellcaster with level 5 spells are medium encounters. Having a 50+% chance to have a 3rd-level slot do a whole lotta nothing can stink.

Especially when monsters typically don't cast alot of spells in your game.

[noob]

"The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the course of action sound reasonable."
"you might suggest that a knight give her warhorse to the first beggar she meets."
Jeez, imagine if they gave an example of how to word your suggestion to sound reasonable.

Maybe "Prove your generosity through giving your horse you value to a beggar"?
(that assumes the knight is generous but of course it looks as if it was a suggestion made by a npc against a player character and it is probably supposed to be "your knight follows all the knightly ideals or you leave the table")

[MrStabby]

What makes it poor is as soon as the spell is a higher level than 5, the chances of completely wasting the reaction and 3rd-level spell instantly becomes greater.

Its a straight Int-check, which means the maximum bonus is +5 but the check by-default starts at a DC14 for merely a 4th-level spell. At 5th-level, spellcaster with level 5 spells are medium encounters. Having a 50+% chance to have a 3rd-level slot do a whole lotta nothing can stink.

Especially when monsters typically don't cast alot of spells in your game.

yeah, welcome to the world of enemies making their saves.

[Asisreo1]

yeah, welcome to the world of enemies making their saves.
Ugh...you don't have to tell me about it.

Its why I think anything that can give disadvantage/penalty on control-type saves are close to broken.

[mistajames]

Only going to be focusing on levels 1-7, because it's so rare to play in games above level 13. Also, there are lots of spells which are quite bad and not worth taking as a result - too many to bother listing them all.

1:Sanctuary, Shield, Sleep.
2: Healing Spirit, Heat Metal, Pass without Trace.
3: Animate Dead, Conjure Animals, Hypnotic Pattern, Fear, Tiny Hut, Plant Growth, Glyph of Warding.
4: Polymorph, Find Greater Steed,
5: Forcecage, Animate Objects, Awaken, Planar Binding, Wall of Stone
6: Contingency, Create Homunculus, Magic Jar, Mass Suggestion.
7: Forcecage, Plane Shift, Simulacrum.

[Galithar]

Only going to be focusing on levels 1-7, because it's so rare to play in games above level 13. Also, there are lots of spells which are quite bad and not worth taking as a result - too many to bother listing them all.

1:Sanctuary, Shield, Sleep.
2: Healing Spirit, Heat Metal, Pass without Trace.
3: Animate Dead, Conjure Animals, Hypnotic Pattern, Fear, Tiny Hut, Plant Growth, Glyph of Warding.
4: Polymorph, Find Greater Steed,
5: Forcecage, Animate Objects, Awaken, Planar Binding, Wall of Stone
6: Contingency, Create Homunculus, Magic Jar, Mass Suggestion.
7: Forcecage, Plane Shift, Simulacrum.

I'm so confused. Is this a list of spells you think are underpowered, overpowered, balanced? I struggle to imagine having Shield, Sleep, and Sanctuary all on the same list regardless of which it is.

[Valmark]

I'm so confused. Is this a list of spells you think are underpowered, overpowered, balanced? I struggle to imagine having Shield, Sleep, and Sanctuary all on the same list regardless of which it is.

Likely the OP ones since they said the underpowered ones are too many to list.

[Galithar]

Likely the OP ones since they said the underpowered ones are too many to list.

Fair point. And most of them I would put on the stronger side, though not all of them.

[Chaosmancer]

What makes it poor is as soon as the spell is a higher level than 5, the chances of completely wasting the reaction and 3rd-level spell instantly becomes greater.

Its a straight Int-check, which means the maximum bonus is +5 but the check by-default starts at a DC14 for merely a 4th-level spell. At 5th-level, spellcaster with level 5 spells are medium encounters. Having a 50+% chance to have a 3rd-level slot do a whole lotta nothing can stink.

Especially when monsters typically don't cast alot of spells in your game.

Sure, but you are canceling a 5th level spell with a 3rd. That is a major tempo win. And there are a few ways to boost it if you really need to.

[Asisreo1]

Sure, but you are canceling a 5th level spell with a 3rd. That is a major tempo win. And there are a few ways to boost it if you really need to.
You're potentially canceling a 5th level spell with a 3rd level spell. In reality, it could be anything from a 9th-level spell to a cantrip since you effectively don't know the spellcasting ability of your enemy nor their best attacks.

It could even not be a whole action that you take away from them.

In fact, that's what happened about 3 weeks ago in a campaign. I said "The priest is casting a spell!" The Wizard counterspelled. "She uses her bonus action to cast Spiritual Weapon."

"Wait, you can't cast 2 leveled spells in a row!" I didn't. It was pretty sad and I had to explain that its the pattern that the spellcaster usually casts but it was a noteworthy occurrence.

Also, the target can just counterspell your counterspell.

[Ashrym]

Bards who take counterspell are still generally winning the counterspell/counterspell battle of attrition with JoaT.

Sorcerers with subtle spell, distant spell, and counterspell can wreck other casters is those battles because of one-sided casting advantage.

In both cases the need is a bit niche. Not taking counterspell and risking getting counterspelled still costs opposing casters slots that aren't offensively used.

I tend to skip counterspell as too situational, not because it doesn't help when it does apply.

[TheUser]

Also, the target can just counterspell your counterspell.
Something I find interesting about this is how DM's and players don't take stock of the free hand required for somatic components. So if one of the caster's hands is already occupied with the somatic component that is casting a spell as their action they must have another free hand to counterspell the incoming counterspell. Almost entirely overlooked and a big limitation to be considered.

[Asisreo1]

Bards who take counterspell are still generally winning the counterspell/counterspell battle of attrition with JoaT.

Sorcerers with subtle spell, distant spell, and counterspell can wreck other casters is those battles because of one-sided casting advantage.

In both cases the need is a bit niche. Not taking counterspell and risking getting counterspelled still costs opposing casters slots that aren't offensively used.

I tend to skip counterspell as too situational, not because it doesn't help when it does apply.
You don't want to go slot-for-slot on NPC's because they usually do not have any more encounters in their adventuring day.

A 6th-level caster has 3 third level slots, 3 second level slots, and 4 first level slots.

A CR 6 mage has 1 5th-level slot, 3 4th-level slot, 3 3rd-level slots, 3 2nd-level slots, and 4 1st-level slots.

That's 10 slots for the PC and 14 slots for the NPC. 3 of which is for counterspell on the PC and 7 of which can be used for counterspell on the NPC.

[MaxWilson]

What makes it poor is as soon as the spell is a higher level than 5, the chances of completely wasting the reaction and 3rd-level spell instantly becomes greater.

Its a straight Int-check, which means the maximum bonus is +5 but the check by-default starts at a DC14 for merely a 4th-level spell. At 5th-level, spellcaster with level 5 spells are medium encounters. Having a 50+% chance to have a 3rd-level slot do a whole lotta nothing can stink.

Especially when monsters typically don't cast alot of spells in your game.

Make friends with a Bard and get some Inspiration. Also, make peace with the fact that you're playing a dice game. Doing nothing with a Counterspell is no different from doing nothing with a Hold Monster.

[Valmark]

Something I find interesting about this is how DM's and players don't take stock of the free hand required for somatic components. So if one of the caster's hands is already occupied with the somatic component that is casting a spell as their action they must have another free hand to counterspell the incoming counterspell. Almost entirely overlooked and a big limitation to be considered.

That kinda depends on the DM- some rule that having a free hand is enough (as in, not holding anything), somatic components don't "lock" your hand.

Some others rule that Counterspelling ends casting after a spell is done casting and thus it's possible to Counter the Counterapell.

Personally I let it happen for the first, but I can see why that could make no sense.
Also I just take War Caster.

[Chaosmancer]

You're potentially canceling a 5th level spell with a 3rd level spell. In reality, it could be anything from a 9th-level spell to a cantrip since you effectively don't know the spellcasting ability of your enemy nor their best attacks.

It could even not be a whole action that you take away from them.

In fact, that's what happened about 3 weeks ago in a campaign. I said "The priest is casting a spell!" The Wizard counterspelled. "She uses her bonus action to cast Spiritual Weapon."

"Wait, you can't cast 2 leveled spells in a row!" I didn't. It was pretty sad and I had to explain that its the pattern that the spellcaster usually casts but it was a noteworthy occurrence.

Also, the target can just counterspell your counterspell.


As I said, I think the fact that spells are hidden before you decide to use counterspell is not good design, and that it is something that is hotly contested. So, I'm not going to comment on that fact. I don't use that, and most people I play with don't really abide by it either.

Counterspelling a counterspell is also tricky, but again I will note, this works for the players as well.

------------------------------------------------------------------



Something I find interesting about this is how DM's and players don't take stock of the free hand required for somatic components. So if one of the caster's hands is already occupied with the somatic component that is casting a spell as their action they must have another free hand to counterspell the incoming counterspell. Almost entirely overlooked and a big limitation to be considered.


Eh, most casters have one free hand and one hand holding their focus, which can also be the hand they use Somatic components for. I agree that it is an interesting case if they have something in their hands, but it is usually an edge case.

[Ashrym]

You don't want to go slot-for-slot on NPC's because they usually do not have any more encounters in their adventuring day.

A 6th-level caster has 3 third level slots, 3 second level slots, and 4 first level slots.

A CR 6 mage has 1 5th-level slot, 3 4th-level slot, 3 3rd-level slots, 3 2nd-level slots, and 4 1st-level slots.

That's 10 slots for the PC and 14 slots for the NPC. 3 of which is for counterspell on the PC and 7 of which can be used for counterspell on the NPC.

The combat only goes slot for slot up until the opposing caster drops. The bard is favored using lower slots to counter higher spells.

A CR 6 mage is meant for 4 PC's and wouldn't be the correct equivalent to a single caster, but...

...the sorcerer example can counterspell and avoid being counterspelled to wreck that CR 6 mage.

[Asisreo1]

The combat only goes slot for slot up until the opposing caster drops. The bard is favored using lower slots to counter higher spells.

A CR 6 mage is meant for 4 PC's and wouldn't be the correct equivalent to a single caster, but...

...the sorcerer example can counterspell and avoid being counterspelled to wreck that CR 6 mage.
In my experience, its pretty rare to have multiple casters capable of counterspell in the same party. It sometimes happen but usually most parties assume 1 caster with counterspell is enough.

But let's assume the bard counterspells every turn for a combat that lasts 3 rounds. Unless the bard themselves are casting cantrips on their turn, they spent 6 spell slots, a minimum of 3 3rd-level slots dedicated to counterspelling in a medium encounter.

Afterwards, the spellcaster still could have preserved a 4th or 5th-level slot while doing his maximum output if the combat lasts longer. Now the bard is down on all of their highest leveled slots after a single medium encounter.

[Azuresun]

One thing that i find amusing is trying to imagine what happens to my mount when it is subjected to Fireball, with the Mounted Combatant's 3rd bullet point effect. It essentially grants the mount Evasion, which means it is a pro at dodging Fireballs, but only when I'm mounted on it. Like, how?? I still can't picture it.

Something like this? (https://i.imgur.com/AOUxwl2.gif)


I didn't think I'd ever see someone consider Counterspell bad- between stopping hostile spellcasters from running, stopping the party from getting blasted, stopping party members from getting Plane Shifted on another plane (as in, enemy was going to Plane Shift the Fighter into the Hells) and some other situations this is a spell that has saved my groups' asses several times (only once did I know what spell was being cast and I was going to Counterspell it anyway).
Talk about different experiences.

I think Counterspell is balanced, I just personally dislike it because it's a spell that means cool things don't happen.

[Chronos]

I haven't yet read the whole thread, but has nobody mentioned Compelled Duel? The benefit is that it gives enemies disadvantage to attack your allies. OK, that's a useful effect, and in fact one that's granted by a lot of other abilities. So what are the drawbacks? Well, let's see...

It requires a spell slot
It allows a save
It ends if you do absolutely anything to any other enemy
It ends if any of your allies do absolutely anything to the creature
It ends if you're ever too far away from the creature
It ends after a minute regardless
It uses your concentration

Any one of those restrictions would have made it balanced with other aggro-holding abilities. But all of them?


On a more general topic, I don't think it's really possible to define "the worst" spell. At some point, a spell is so bad that you'd never use it. And once you get to that point, it doesn't matter precisely how bad the spell is, because all spells that never get used are equally bad.

[Rebonack]

I'll throw down Flesh to Stone as an example of an under-powered spell. Targets Con, which most monsters have a pretty solid save in, does nothing if it flubs. If the initial save fails the target is Restrained and then starts making saves each turn to try to shake off the effect. At best it might turn something to stone three rounds later.

Compare that to Hold Monster upcast to level six so it targets two foes instead of one and I think we've got a pretty clear winner.

I suspect that if Flesh to Stone just Restrained the target with no save and then the checks to try to throw it off started happening then it might be worth taking. As it stands Irresistible Dance absolutely blows it out of the water as a 6th level single target disable.

[Chaosmancer]

In my experience, its pretty rare to have multiple casters capable of counterspell in the same party. It sometimes happen but usually most parties assume 1 caster with counterspell is enough.

But let's assume the bard counterspells every turn for a combat that lasts 3 rounds. Unless the bard themselves are casting cantrips on their turn, they spent 6 spell slots, a minimum of 3 3rd-level slots dedicated to counterspelling in a medium encounter.

Afterwards, the spellcaster still could have preserved a 4th or 5th-level slot while doing his maximum output if the combat lasts longer. Now the bard is down on all of their highest leveled slots after a single medium encounter.


Sure, I get you. Counterspelling everything though is usually incredibly expensive (and again, I know, I hate the Xanathar rule for identifying spells too)

But, let us say that the Bard Successfully counter's a Cone of Cold that would have dealt 30 damage to 5 people. That is 150 damage they just prevented. That is an incredible value for a single spell. And yes, you have to roll for that to happen, but you don't need to roll to counter a hypnotic pattern, which prevents the loss of, we'll say an average of 3 actions?


Counterspell has limits, but it has those limits because when things work out, it is incredibly powerful.If it just automatically countered any spell, with no check, it would be too good.

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I haven't yet read the whole thread, but has nobody mentioned Compelled Duel? The benefit is that it gives enemies disadvantage to attack your allies. OK, that's a useful effect, and in fact one that's granted by a lot of other abilities. So what are the drawbacks? Well, let's see...

It requires a spell slot
It allows a save
It ends if you do absolutely anything to any other enemy
It ends if any of your allies do absolutely anything to the creature
It ends if you're ever too far away from the creature
It ends after a minute regardless
It uses your concentration

Any one of those restrictions would have made it balanced with other aggro-holding abilities. But all of them?


On a more general topic, I don't think it's really possible to define "the worst" spell. At some point, a spell is so bad that you'd never use it. And once you get to that point, it doesn't matter precisely how bad the spell is, because all spells that never get used are equally bad.


Hmm... the spell slot isn't really a limit on it. Though being a paladin spell comes into play. Thematically it has to have the limits of you can only really attack that creature and your allies have to stay out of it. Otherwise it would not be a duel.

I do think that there could be a stronger penalty on the enemy for attacking your allies. I'm... I get the too far away. And it is if you end your turn. The point is that you can't run away from the enemy you are forcing to duel you.



I think I would get rid of the concentration though, because the duel ending because the enemy hit you once is kind of stupid.

It certainly isn't a great spell though, but a slightly harsher penalty and if the DM runs it as intended (you and me fight to the death) then I think it isn't useless.



I'll throw down Flesh to Stone as an example of an under-powered spell. Targets Con, which most monsters have a pretty solid save in, does nothing if it flubs. If the initial save fails the target is Restrained and then starts making saves each turn to try to shake off the effect. At best it might turn something to stone three rounds later.

Compare that to Hold Monster upcast to level six so it targets two foes instead of one and I think we've got a pretty clear winner.

I suspect that if Flesh to Stone just Restrained the target with no save and then the checks to try to throw it off started happening then it might be worth taking. As it stands Irresistible Dance absolutely blows it out of the water as a 6th level single target disable.


All true, but there is a point that needs to be remembered.

Flesh to Stone is permanent death if the enemy does petrify. Thinking of it as a debuff is misleading, because if it works to plan, you have for all intents and purposes killed that enemy.

It is hard to do, you need to concentrate for the full minute, and the enemy needs a total of four failed saves, but it basically kills anything made of flesh at that point. No size restriction, no hp restriction.

And I'll note, that with the new Mind Sliver Cantrip, you can give disadvantage on those saves, and there are a few other stacking debuffs you could apply.

[noob]

I'll throw down Flesh to Stone as an example of an under-powered spell. Targets Con, which most monsters have a pretty solid save in, does nothing if it flubs. If the initial save fails the target is Restrained and then starts making saves each turn to try to shake off the effect. At best it might turn something to stone three rounds later.

Compare that to Hold Monster upcast to level six so it targets two foes instead of one and I think we've got a pretty clear winner.

I suspect that if Flesh to Stone just Restrained the target with no save and then the checks to try to throw it off started happening then it might be worth taking. As it stands Irresistible Dance absolutely blows it out of the water as a 6th level single target disable.

I do not think it is supposed to be used for fighting.
I think it is supposed to be used to keep prisoners more conveniently(you can now put your prisoners in your bag of holding or just drag them around without bothering about the prisoner trying to escape or needing to feed it).

[Gyor]

Demiplane is the single worst high level spell, I mockingly call it Mordenkien's Magifscent Walk in Closet. It should have been like the spell Gensis, instead it's just a glorified closet that is over priced. Compare it to Magifiscent Masion, Mighty Fortress, and Temple of the Gods and how truely pathetic the spell is becomes apparent.

[Valmark]

Demiplane is the single worst high level spell, I mockingly call it Mordenkien's Magifscent Walk in Closet. It should have been like the spell Gensis, instead it's just a glorified closet that is over priced. Compare it to Magifiscent Masion, Mighty Fortress, and Temple of the Gods and how truely pathetic the spell is becomes apparent.

I mean, an extradimensional space only accessible by others if you know what/who to look for and where (and have the same spell) looks like one of those spells that are extremely good when you need them.

I at least saw uses that the other spells could have never replicated (besides Wish. Duh).

It IS situational though, more for the effect then the cost.

[LordCdrMilitant]

I'm surprised so many people think counterspell is too good.

I've always considered it a pretty bad spell. It's resource economy is bad, it effect probability is like trying to make a guardsman's armor save to win the game which makes it worthless to rely on tactically, and it's got a set of rule that makes it nearly defunct anyway. The only thing it's really got going for it is that in the of chance that it works, it disrupts the opponent's tempo.



Here's my thoughts on it:
If you trade equal-for-equal, from the expendable resource position, it's a wash, which is also bad. Expending resources to literally have no evolution of the game state is not a tenable long-term strategy. Particularly because you're to a degree worse off if you counterspell than if you don't in most cases, because the enemy caster had already committed their action but you're also losing your future offensive capability and flexibility by using your counterspell. On top of that, just soaking the incoming spells effect is often times the preferable cast: damage is just damage, unless you're all going to die right now it's better to counterattack than it is to defend with your resources, and if it's not there's a pretty solid chance that the save would have been passed anyway and the counterspell would have been wasted, and that's before considering if you can clear whatever effect was done afterwords before it becomes a problem. Tactically, Counterspell is a combo breaker and action economy control piece, not a general use attack pattern like fireball, you don't go around counterspelling everything that tries to cast, you counterspell that one critical spell.... which it sucks at and just can't do:

The fact that it requires an unmodified INT check to activate means that it has at best a 55% chance of activating, and mostly likely worse down to a 25% chance. This is not an effect to rely on, much less to expend a very limited available resource to attempt. Like, it's pretty straight math, you don't hinge critical outcomes on a 25% chance of success. If you can't absorb and process the effect of whatever is going to be cast going off, counting on counterspell to save you is just bad tactics. If you can absorb it, you should almost certainly save you slot for an offensive action. A 55%-25% chance of taking effect would be acceptable as a passive effect or effect you used on pretty much everything, but it is absolutely not acceptable for use on pretty much everything due to it's poor economy, and it's just not able to be counted on to disrupt something critical at the decisive moment. Because of it's low effect change, you just can't use it to play with the action economy when it matters.

On top of that, you're at the disadvantage on the tactical initiative side, they're still acting and you're still reacting. The ball is in their court to determine how it plays out. If they really want to stick their spell because it would have been critical and decisive, they can counterspell your counterspell because they intrinsically have their reactions online. They still get what was more important to them and the decisive effect off, so the situation is worse for you. If they decide to let you counter their spell, then you're still in a marginally worse place than you were before, because they dragged you down to the degraded tactical position they were going to be at anyway, and if they're happy to let you counterspell it then it was unlikely to be decisive enough to have meaningfully evolved the state beyond the progressive race to the bottom anyway.


Then, as a cherry on the cake, you don't even know what you're about to counterspell! It takes someone else to spend their reaction to identify it, then they have to communicate it to you, and then you counterspell.




As for stopping supernatural activated abilities, from a lore prespective, spell disrupts the flow of magical energies that compose and control the spell so that the spell fails to activate fizzles. If counterspell was physically messing up the casting my making the caster lose focus, the fighter could do it by bonking them, and it wouldn't take a spell slot because you're not doing anything magical. There's no reason this shouldn't work on magical non-spell abilities, because spell like abilities are still drawing on and powering themselves from magical energies and would still be stopped by cutting off or disrupting that flow.

From a tactical perspective, magical monster abilities should be counterable, because they're not intended to be a tactically different function from spellcasting, they're intended to show that the monster is magical and have instinctive magical abilities. Shutting down a creature's spell like ability is not tactically different from shutting down a sentient's spellcast. In addition, restricting it to spells cast only even further limits its effect by restricting its targets and the circumstances in which a counterspell could be effective if it works, making it an even more niche ability that fails to function in its niche.



TL:DR
I consistently have a problem with spells that are structured like a lottery. Something potentially amazing happens in that like 1-in-6 chance that the spell actually takes effect, but like the rest of the time it does nothing. This is just tactically terrible. Effects should be structured to be reliably activated with lower average effect in these cases, so that you can plan around them and make tactically informed decisions. Planning on making a one in a million shot does not a sound strategy in anything but a case of desperation constitute.

And as a GM or game designer, if you're going to create abilities that you basically say that while the effect is a cool effect, you don't like it when it happens in practice [or more precisely, you're fine if they use the cool effect on mooks they could have just fragged and been done with, but any time it would actually matter you don't want it to "ruin your dramatic boss fight with the players using strategy and tactics other than 'deal more damage' "] so you're just going to make it's trigger chance absurdly low, you should probably not write that ability into the game anyway no matter how cool it is, because it's almost always going to negatively affect players far more than it will affect your precious boss monster simply through the law of it will be used a lot more against them, so eventually it will happen.

And then, on top of that, the thing that happens once in a blue moon when you successfully counterspell is just not that awesome either. Other spells can affect the action economy a far better than 1 action and 1 spell slot for 1 reaction and 1 equal level/3rd level spell slot trade and potentially more reliably, which you might as well do instead.




If I were to change counterspell:
1: General rule change: spells with a verbal component are immediately identifiable to those who can hear the words recited loudly and clearly, spells with a somatic components are immediately identifiable to those who can see the component performed with hand gestures and technicolor lights. [Basically, unless subtle spelled, you know what spell is being cast]
2: Counterspell text change: Counterspell always takes effect without die roll required. This has several positive consequences: it remains validly useful as the primary power factor moves beyond 3rd level spell slots and they become obsolete, it can be planned around its use and take effect in the clutch moments its used, and it gives a recourse for lower level casters facing casters of even one level higher so they're not completely helpless.
3: Counterspell can target supernatural abilities. This is just from a lore and logic perspective, that since it thematically is a manipulation of the magical flow to cut off the magical flow to a spell, it could also cut off the magical flow to a magical nonsentient creature's magical ability.

[Pex]

Demiplane is the single worst high level spell, I mockingly call it Mordenkien's Magifscent Walk in Closet. It should have been like the spell Gensis, instead it's just a glorified closet that is over priced. Compare it to Magifiscent Masion, Mighty Fortress, and Temple of the Gods and how truely pathetic the spell is becomes apparent.

Maybe it's too high in level, but there have been many times in low to mid level games where I wished the party had access to it. Storage of valuable or important things can be paramount, and a bag of holding is not enough. It can work for something small, but in personal opinion I'd rather the object be in a safe place no one can get to than have it with us while adventuring. In high level games the need for safe storage remains important.

It's part of the reason I like Genie Warlock so much.

[Ashrym]

In my experience, its pretty rare to have multiple casters capable of counterspell in the same party. It sometimes happen but usually most parties assume 1 caster with counterspell is enough.

But let's assume the bard counterspells every turn for a combat that lasts 3 rounds. Unless the bard themselves are casting cantrips on their turn, they spent 6 spell slots, a minimum of 3 3rd-level slots dedicated to counterspelling in a medium encounter.

Afterwards, the spellcaster still could have preserved a 4th or 5th-level slot while doing his maximum output if the combat lasts longer. Now the bard is down on all of their highest leveled slots after a single medium encounter.

The CR 6 had nothing to do with how many PC's can cast counterspell. It's 4 characters against whom the CR 6 caster is casting spells and countering spells. The party with a bard and a cleric or wizard or druid or sorcerer has more spells to be countered than a single bard.

The typical party has a couple of spell casters so double those bard slots against the mage NPC.

My bard example meant to be against a similar opponent, not one meant to face the bard plus 3 more.

Your argument is counterspell isn't worth it because a 9th level caster had more slots than a 6th level bard.


I'm surprised so many people think counterspell is too good.

I've always considered it a pretty bad spell. It's resource economy is bad, it effect probability is like trying to make a guardsman's armor save to win the game which makes it worthless to rely on tactically, and it's got a set of rule that makes it nearly defunct anyway. The only thing it's really got going for it is that in the of chance that it works, it disrupts the opponent's tempo.



Here's my thoughts on it:
If you trade equal-for-equal, from the expendable resource position, it's a wash, which is also bad. Expending resources to literally have no evolution of the game state is not a tenable long-term strategy. Particularly because you're to a degree worse off if you counterspell than if you don't in most cases, because the enemy caster had already committed their action but you're also losing your future offensive capability and flexibility by using your counterspell. On top of that, just soaking the incoming spells effect is often times the preferable cast: damage is just damage, unless you're all going to die right now it's better to counterattack than it is to defend with your resources, and if it's not there's a pretty solid chance that the save would have been passed anyway and the counterspell would have been wasted, and that's before considering if you can clear whatever effect was done afterwords before it becomes a problem. Tactically, Counterspell is a combo breaker and action economy control piece, not a general use attack pattern like fireball, you don't go around counterspelling everything that tries to cast, you counterspell that one critical spell.... which it sucks at and just can't do:

The fact that it requires an unmodified INT check to activate means that it has at best a 55% chance of activating, and mostly likely worse down to a 25% chance. This is not an effect to rely on, much less to expend a very limited available resource to attempt. Like, it's pretty straight math, you don't hinge critical outcomes on a 25% chance of success. If you can't absorb and process the effect of whatever is going to be cast going off, counting on counterspell to save you is just bad tactics. If you can absorb it, you should almost certainly save you slot for an offensive action. A 55%-25% chance of taking effect would be acceptable as a passive effect or effect you used on pretty much everything, but it is absolutely not acceptable for use on pretty much everything due to it's poor economy, and it's just not able to be counted on to disrupt something critical at the decisive moment. Because of it's low effect change, you just can't use it to play with the action economy when it matters.

On top of that, you're at the disadvantage on the tactical initiative side, they're still acting and you're still reacting. The ball is in their court to determine how it plays out. If they really want to stick their spell because it would have been critical and decisive, they can counterspell your counterspell because they intrinsically have their reactions online. They still get what was more important to them and the decisive effect off, so the situation is worse for you. If they decide to let you counter their spell, then you're still in a marginally worse place than you were before, because they dragged you down to the degraded tactical position they were going to be at anyway, and if they're happy to let you counterspell it then it was unlikely to be decisive enough to have meaningfully evolved the state beyond the progressive race to the bottom anyway.


Then, as a cherry on the cake, you don't even know what you're about to counterspell! It takes someone else to spend their reaction to identify it, then they have to communicate it to you, and then you counterspell.




As for stopping supernatural activated abilities, from a lore prespective, spell disrupts the flow of magical energies that compose and control the spell so that the spell fails to activate fizzles. If counterspell was physically messing up the casting my making the caster lose focus, the fighter could do it by bonking them, and it wouldn't take a spell slot because you're not doing anything magical. There's no reason this shouldn't work on magical non-spell abilities, because spell like abilities are still drawing on and powering themselves from magical energies and would still be stopped by cutting off or disrupting that flow.

From a tactical perspective, magical monster abilities should be counterable, because they're not intended to be a tactically different function from spellcasting, they're intended to show that the monster is magical and have instinctive magical abilities. Shutting down a creature's spell like ability is not tactically different from shutting down a sentient's spellcast. In addition, restricting it to spells cast only even further limits its effect by restricting its targets and the circumstances in which a counterspell could be effective if it works, making it an even more niche ability that fails to function in its niche.



TL:DR
I consistently have a problem with spells that are structured like a lottery. Something potentially amazing happens in that like 1-in-6 chance that the spell actually takes effect, but like the rest of the time it does nothing. This is just tactically terrible. Effects should be structured to be reliably activated with lower average effect in these cases, so that you can plan around them and make tactically informed decisions. Planning on making a one in a million shot does not a sound strategy in anything but a case of desperation constitute.

And as a GM or game designer, if you're going to create abilities that you basically say that while the effect is a cool effect, you don't like it when it happens in practice [or more precisely, you're fine if they use the cool effect on mooks they could have just fragged and been done with, but any time it would actually matter you don't want it to "ruin your dramatic boss fight with the players using strategy and tactics other than 'deal more damage' "] so you're just going to make it's trigger chance absurdly low, you should probably not write that ability into the game anyway no matter how cool it is, because it's almost always going to negatively affect players far more than it will affect your precious boss monster simply through the law of it will be used a lot more against them, so eventually it will happen.

And then, on top of that, the thing that happens once in a blue moon when you successfully counterspell is just not that awesome either. Other spells can affect the action economy a far better than 1 action and 1 spell slot for 1 reaction and 1 equal level/3rd level spell slot trade and potentially more reliably, which you might as well do instead.




If I were to change counterspell:
1: General rule change: spells with a verbal component are immediately identifiable to those who can hear the words recited loudly and clearly, spells with a somatic components are immediately identifiable to those who can see the component performed with hand gestures and technicolor lights. [Basically, unless subtle spelled, you know what spell is being cast]
2: Counterspell text change: Counterspell always takes effect without die roll required. This has several positive consequences: it remains validly useful as the primary power factor moves beyond 3rd level spell slots and they become obsolete, it can be planned around its use and take effect in the clutch moments its used, and it gives a recourse for lower level casters facing casters of even one level higher so they're not completely helpless.
3: Counterspell can target supernatural abilities. This is just from a lore and logic perspective, that since it thematically is a manipulation of the magical flow to cut off the magical flow to a spell, it could also cut off the magical flow to a magical nonsentient creature's magical ability.

Counterspell isn't too good. It's rather niche IME. It's just that when it does come into play it can be very significant in the action it denies.

[SirDidymus]

Counterspell's also more useful for a couple of subclasses. A Diviner's Portent can turn that check into 100% success and a 10th level Abjurer has a 50% chance of countering a Meteor Swarm with a 3rd level slot.

[Asisreo1]

The CR 6 had nothing to do with how many PC's can cast counterspell. It's 4 characters against whom the CR 6 caster is casting spells and countering spells. The party with a bard and a cleric or wizard or druid or sorcerer has more spells to be countered than a single bard.

The typical party has a couple of spell casters so double those bard slots against the mage NPC.

My bard example meant to be against a similar opponent, not one meant to face the bard plus 3 more.

Your argument is counterspell isn't worth it because a 9th level caster had more slots than a 6th level bard.

I'm talking solely about counterspelling a counterspell. The 1-to-1 tradeoff is expensive and not completely great, either.

The point is that the NPC's spell slots need to be used as soon as applicable or else they are never used after the fight. Therefore, the NPC's slots of equal level are far less valuable than your own.

I'm talking solely about a medium encounter against a single relatively squishy target. If you lose more than a single 3rd-level spell during this combat, you've probably used up way more than you needed.

If a party faces 4 priests in a battle, the priests have 4 turns worth of spells none of which can necessarily be isolated as their TPK-threatening move. It also becomes an even worse trade-off. And 4 priests in my example is only a Hard encounter, not even a Deadly one.

[noob]

The point is that counterspell is great in a 1 casting focused boss vs a whole adventurer team scenario because the resources to recover from a meteor swarm or another high damage spell is higher than the resources to cast counterspell three times in a row(and if the bbeg casts another spell in reaction to the counterspell it is unlikely that it is not another counterspell so a second party member could counterspell the counterspell).
And some gms likes 1 super caster BBEG vs full adventurer team encounters and will make those encounters disproportionately more common (like how some gms likes big monsters and will use them more than others)
According to some people if someone does find out what the spell is then they can shout what it is to the counterspeller.

[Darzil]

The key thing about player vs NPC counter spell is not that you are trading spell slots, but that you are nullifying the NPCs actions (which are probably among the most dangerous you could be facing, often area effect damage or cc) at the cost of the spell slot (and one players action). If it is a one vs one combat, then yes, it is much weaker. If you are buying time for meleers to get close, it is great.

[mistajames]

I'm talking solely about counterspelling a counterspell. The 1-to-1 tradeoff is expensive and not completely great, either.

By the time that you could feasibly be dueling arcane spellcasters and counterspelling Counterspells, the game has changed quite quickly. It also depends on how hard your DM's game is.


Counterspelling your Counterspell means that they can't cast shield or use other reactions. They can only counter 1 spell per level.
There are limitations on counterspelling, the big ones being that a) you need to see the caster b) you need to be in range of the caster, and c) you need to have the reaction available to do so. These come up more often than you think. In particular, 60ft range is a lot when fighting a squishy, mobile caster.
If the spell lands, it's very possible that it could kill or disable one or more PCs. It's not limited to stuff like Meteor Swarm - even stuff like Fear, Hypnotic Pattern and Wall of Force is deadly when used to split the party. If you prevent another PC from being killed/disabled, your Counterspell can be "valued" as adding your ally's entire round of actions too.
Spells like Globe of Invulnerability can also nullify an enemy mage's Counterspells.
It's expensive for the enemy too. Unless this is life-or-death, they should be reluctant to use up all their high-level slots as this could leave them vulnerable later.
Most casters don't have access to Counterspell. Basically, Lich, Mage, Archmage, have it in the MM... that's it. Custom arcane caster NPCs might (and often do, in my experience) have it, but most of those don't either.

[Asisreo1]

By the time that you could feasibly be dueling arcane spellcasters and counterspelling Counterspells, the game has changed quite quickly. It also depends on how hard your DM's game is.


Counterspelling your Counterspell means that they can't cast shield or use other reactions. They can only counter 1 spell per level.
There are limitations on counterspelling, the big ones being that a) you need to see the caster b) you need to be in range of the caster, and c) you need to have the reaction available to do so. These come up more often than you think. In particular, 60ft range is a lot when fighting a squishy, mobile caster.
If the spell lands, it's very possible that it could kill or disable one or more PCs. It's not limited to stuff like Meteor Swarm - even stuff like Fear, Hypnotic Pattern and Wall of Force is deadly when used to split the party. If you prevent another PC from being killed/disabled, your Counterspell can be "valued" as adding your ally's entire round of actions too.
Spells like Globe of Invulnerability can also nullify an enemy mage's Counterspells.
It's expensive for the enemy too. Unless this is life-or-death, they should be reluctant to use up all their high-level slots as this could leave them vulnerable later.
Most casters don't have access to Counterspell. Basically, Lich, Mage, Archmage, have it in the MM... that's it. Custom arcane caster NPCs might (and often do, in my experience) have it, but most of those don't either.

Most of what you're saying about Counterspell v. Counterspell is the same for Counterspell v. Other spells and is precisely its problems.

Just as a spellcaster could have used Absorb Elements or Shield, they're using it on Counterspell. Being in-range of the original counterspeller is a given since they couldn't target you with counterspell if they weren't in the spell's range to being with. This is purely a limitation for counterspell V. Other spell. Other spells nullifying Counterspell only hurts the argument for counterspell.

Its somewhat expensive for the NPC to counterspell, but its severely less expensive for them than the PC's since the PC has a budget they must distribute their Spell Slots over the course of a possible several encounters. The NPC usually only has to worry about a single combat before they themselves can long rest.

[Osuniev]

Its somewhat expensive for the NPC to counterspell, but its severely less expensive for them than the PC's since the PC has a budget they must distribute their Spell Slots over the course of a possible several encounters. The NPC usually only has to worry about a single combat before they themselves can long rest.

Even if the DM does consider that the NPC has mor use to their spell slots than just this fight, (which I often do, but I'm playing with Gritty Realism, long rests being difficult for spellcasters becomes part of the "lower-magic" lore), the point is, MOST DnD fights in MOST campaigns ARE to the death, and most NPCs capable of sing COunterspell shoudl be intelligent enough to realise they are LOSING.

In almost every encounter a DnD party faces, the intelligent ennemies should REALISE THEY ARE LOSING soon enough. Even if the CR of the Encounter is TWICE that of Deadly. So, for them using COunterspell is worthwhile because if they don't use the spell slot they are probably dead. For the PCs, the likelihood of the TPK is usually rather small, so saving the Spell Slot for a future fight makes sense.

[Valmark]

Personally when a chance to Counterspell crops up it doesn't really matter if my slots are more useful because I need to fight more afterwards or if the spell could be "useless" (meaning not threatening enough to warrant a counter)- I don't know what it is and it could be something that puts us at heavy disadvantage, so it's getting Counterspelled (if I pass the check when needed, that is).

Thus Counterspell is one of the best spells to me- though I do recognize the obvious downsides to it.

Also I'm pretty happy when cool stuff doesn't happen if it happens against us :p (the opposite being an obvious danger).

[Necrosnoop110]

From memory...
Level 2
Find steed (OP)

What's your take on Find Steed?

[TheUser]

What people here seem to be ignoring is that counterspell isn't about slot efficiency. Counterspell is about ACTION ECONOMY.

If I can spend a reaction to snuff out another caster's action then even if I only have a 50% chance to succeed I am taking it.

They just lost the bulk of their turn and all it cost me was a reaction. Phenominal dominance of the action economy but somewhat costly in resources. The hope is that denying that enemy their action for that one round can turn the tide enough to swing the fight.

If you are counterspelling more than 1-2 times in an encounter you'll gas out quick. If the caster's are abundant it's better to adopt a mass disruption option like Sleet Storm or Silence (but you'll need a way to keep them in there). But odds are you're already concentrating on a Hypnotic Pattern, Fear, Wall of Fire etc. So counterspell becomes this concentration free dueling tool that is quite honestly, very niche but very effective in that niche.

It just so happens that some (sub)classes (Bards, abjurers, diviners, subtle sorcerers and casters weird enough to use enhance ability...) use counterspell very effectively.

As an aside, I actually ended up taking Globe of Invulnerability in addition to counterspell in a Rise of Tiamat campaign where you fight A LOT of enemy wizards and that spell can do some serious work against mass casters.

Without spoiling, there's an encounter meant to be omega levels of lethal and we managed to escape thanks to a readied Globe of Invulnerability blocking an incoming spell barrage and also blocking even upcasted spells of a lower level (counterspell attempts on my teleporting the group away).

If your enemies wise up against counterspell tactics it can be pretty hard to make it work. As stated, it has many limitations. This is often why I enjoy subtle counterspell; the enemies must scratch their heads in wonder as to why their spells are failing.

[Rebonack]

All true, but there is a point that needs to be remembered.

Flesh to Stone is permanent death if the enemy does petrify. Thinking of it as a debuff is misleading, because if it works to plan, you have for all intents and purposes killed that enemy.

It is hard to do, you need to concentrate for the full minute, and the enemy needs a total of four failed saves, but it basically kills anything made of flesh at that point. No size restriction, no hp restriction.

And I'll note, that with the new Mind Sliver Cantrip, you can give disadvantage on those saves, and there are a few other stacking debuffs you could apply.

If an enemy flubs their save four times in a row against Hold Monster I can absolutely guarantee you that they will be even deader than if they had been petrified.

[MaxWilson]

If an enemy flubs their save four times in a row against Hold Monster I can absolutely guarantee you that they will be even deader than if they had been petrified.

Not always. E.g. a Boneclaw can survive 1000 HP of damage, but petrification "kills" it permanently.

[MrStabby]

What's your take on Find Steed?

So I rated this as on the powerful side due to its duration. It just keeps going...

And its versaility - insane for a never ending (at least in terms of duration) level 2 spell. A scout, a messenger (telepathic communication and the ability to speak is strong) or just another party member to pull on a rope at the right time.

It can do all the stuff a mount you purchased can do as well - cary, pull etc..

It has combat benefits; sharing spells can actually be a pretty big deal - depending on your class and feat mix.

To my mind its power and versatility and duration give it an impact way beyond what a level 2 spell should give. The obvious test is if you would consider it as a magical secrets pick for a bard - if so, it is in the handful of most powerful spells in the game.



What people here seem to be ignoring is that counterspell isn't about slot efficiency. Counterspell is about ACTION ECONOMY.

If I can spend a reaction to snuff out another caster's action then even if I only have a 50% chance to succeed I am taking it.

They just lost the bulk of their turn and all it cost me was a reaction. Phenominal dominance of the action economy but somewhat costly in resources. The hope is that denying that enemy their action for that one round can turn the tide enough to swing the fight.

If you are counterspelling more than 1-2 times in an encounter you'll gas out quick. If the caster's are abundant it's better to adopt a mass disruption option like Sleet Storm or Silence (but you'll need a way to keep them in there). But odds are you're already concentrating on a Hypnotic Pattern, Fear, Wall of Fire etc. So counterspell becomes this concentration free dueling tool that is quite honestly, very niche but very effective in that niche.

It just so happens that some (sub)classes (Bards, abjurers, diviners, subtle sorcerers and casters weird enough to use enhance ability...) use counterspell very effectively.

As an aside, I actually ended up taking Globe of Invulnerability in addition to counterspell in a Rise of Tiamat campaign where you fight A LOT of enemy wizards and that spell can do some serious work against mass casters.

Without spoiling, there's an encounter meant to be omega levels of lethal and we managed to escape thanks to a readied Globe of Invulnerability blocking an incoming spell barrage and also blocking even upcasted spells of a lower level (counterspell attempts on my teleporting the group away).

If your enemies wise up against counterspell tactics it can be pretty hard to make it work. As stated, it has many limitations. This is often why I enjoy subtle counterspell; the enemies must scratch their heads in wonder as to why their spells are failing.

I would also add fiend pact warlock to the list as being a very effective counterspeller. A short rest D10 to an ability check is kind of a big deal; I would tend to rate this slightly higher than bard. Bard can have a bonus to all counterspell attempts but it peaks at +3 from jack of all trades but in practice I find that stopping a smaller number of spells hard is more important.

[Amnestic]

To my mind its power and versatility and duration give it an impact way beyond what a level 2 spell should give. The obvious test is if you would consider it as a magical secrets pick for a bard - if so, it is in the handful of most powerful spells in the game.


I dunno, it's a '2nd level' spell but it's paladin only, it turns up at 5th level, when other casters are getting their 3rd level spells. Should it be compared to other 2nd level spells, or 3rd level spells? I'm inclined to say 3rds really, since what's most important is when the spell comes online, rather than what official 'level' it has. Exaggerated example: If a hypothetical class only got 1st level spells, but their spells only happened at level 18+ and were equivalent in power to 9th level spells on wizards, would we compare it to 1st level wizard spells or 9th level wizard spells?

Bard being able to grab ranger/paladin unique spells levels earlier than the original class can is a problem with the bard class, not with the spell itself, in my opinion (something I houseruled away myself - it's bad design).

[Chaosmancer]

If an enemy flubs their save four times in a row against Hold Monster I can absolutely guarantee you that they will be even deader than if they had been petrified.

Sure, if someone is hitting it every single round.

But what if you just ignored it in favor of hitting the other enemies? That is the big Difference. Hold Monster sets them up for you to focus fire on them.

Flesh to Stone can be fire and forget. If you aren't attacking them, I mean, Restrain is nice but not nearly as "must hit them now" as Paralyze. So if they break free, okay, you bought a few turns of them being out of the fight (most likely) and if they don't you killed them with a single action, and everyone else focused on the rest of the fight.

[MrStabby]

I dunno, it's a '2nd level' spell but it's paladin only, it turns up at 5th level, when other casters are getting their 3rd level spells. Should it be compared to other 2nd level spells, or 3rd level spells? I'm inclined to say 3rds really, since what's most important is when the spell comes online, rather than what official 'level' it has. Exaggerated example: If a hypothetical class only got 1st level spells, but their spells only happened at level 18+ and were equivalent in power to 9th level spells on wizards, would we compare it to 1st level wizard spells or 9th level wizard spells?

Bard being able to grab ranger/paladin unique spells levels earlier than the original class can is a problem with the bard class, not with the spell itself, in my opinion (something I houseruled away myself - it's bad design).

I figured we were rating spells themselves, rather than the class on which they came. Even if it is the class, there is still the case that its overpowered - if the Paladin has 2nd level spell slots as powerful as 3rd level slots at level 5 then that is pushing the class to be a full caster AND have all the awesome paladin stuff on top. Would the class be more in line with the power levels of other classes if it's spell list were weaker?

The right measure depends on how someone might interpret the thread - if someone were to say "I want to homebrew a summoning spell of level 2, what power level should I not exceed" then I would say that this is is an example of something beyond that threshold. Or if someone is considering adding it as a domain spell for a homebrew cleric domain...

I also think if you are going to evaluate this in the context of the classes that can pick it up, you should do it for all of them. Saying the spell is not a problematic power level for bards because you house rule it not to be is fine, but it does mean it is only not problematic if these rules are in place. I do still think it is worth a mention.

[ff7hero]

I figured we were rating spells themselves, rather than the class on which they came. Even if it is the class, there is still the case that its overpowered - if the Paladin has 2nd level spell slots as powerful as 3rd level slots at level 5 then that is pushing the class to be a full caster AND have all the awesome paladin stuff on top. Would the class be more in line with the power levels of other classes if it's spell list were weaker?

The right measure depends on how someone might interpret the thread - if someone were to say "I want to homebrew a summoning spell of level 2, what power level should I not exceed" then I would say that this is is an example of something beyond that threshold. Or if someone is considering adding it as a domain spell for a homebrew cleric domain...

I also think if you are going to evaluate this in the context of the classes that can pick it up, you should do it for all of them. Saying the spell is not a problematic power level for bards because you house rule it not to be is fine, but it does mean it is only not problematic if these rules are in place. I do still think it is worth a mention.

Might be worth noting that even Lore Bards get Find Steed a level later than Paladins. Find Greater Steed is the the one Bards can grab early.

[Gignere]

Might be worth noting that even Lore Bards get Find Steed a level later than Paladins. Find Greater Steed is the the one Bards can grab early.

Find Steed isn’t even that great. I don’t think of it as OP or UP I think it is balanced. Most dungeons your steed wouldn’t fit if you’re medium. For small Paladins this spell is better but I wouldn’t call it OP. I can’t even think of a situation where this spell would trivialize an encounter unlike truly OP spells.

Like look at find familiar, you get a flying scout and if you’re traveling overland basically forget about ambushing the party because you can’t since at a height of 100 feet you can see like 6 miles out. It can fit in every dungeon, and you can share its senses.

You can communicate with the find steed but it doesn’t work nearly as well as a familiar as a scout. There are edge cases that it might be better like if you wanted to find a bandit hideout you can let your steed be stolen but these are edge cases. I just think it’s a generally useful spell neither UP or OP.

[Jerrykhor]

So I rated this as on the powerful side due to its duration. It just keeps going...

And its versaility - insane for a never ending (at least in terms of duration) level 2 spell. A scout, a messenger (telepathic communication and the ability to speak is strong) or just another party member to pull on a rope at the right time.

It can do all the stuff a mount you purchased can do as well - cary, pull etc..

It has combat benefits; sharing spells can actually be a pretty big deal - depending on your class and feat mix.

To my mind its power and versatility and duration give it an impact way beyond what a level 2 spell should give. The obvious test is if you would consider it as a magical secrets pick for a bard - if so, it is in the handful of most powerful spells in the game.


Its main weakness is how easily it dies. I have been playing a paladin along with a fellow paladin party member, i have Mounted Combatant feat, he don't. The difference is very stark. His mount would die at the slightest AOE damage, while mine would practically live forever (thanks to the feat and the auras) unless i dismount. But the feat ultimately is a crutch to make a mounted build work, because it depends on it. On its own however, its about as powerful as a level 2 spell should be.

[Valmark]

Personally I find Find Steed to be balanced- it's basically a war familiar which saves a lot of money when compared to the buyable version.

I consider Find Greater Steed to be far better for it's level- although it could be balanced with how much it takes to get the spell.
Note: I assume when I say that FGS is better that the rider has precautions against plummeting to their death.